Blood Ties, Blood Lies
by Moonglow gal
Summary: A horrifying truth that makes Kagome seal the well. A weighty duty that forces Inuyasha to move on. A spy, a survivor, a mysterious child. And behind it all, a compelling prophecy that warns them: All is not as it seems.
1. Nighttime Intrusions

**Blood Ties, Blood Lies**

**Chapter One: Nighttime Intrusions**

_Hey guys! Those of you who are familiar with BTBL know that this is a re-write. Those of you who aren't…well, I'm just glad you found this now that I've had a chance to polish the incredibly weak beginning to my little baby here._

_THE SETTING: This story takes place just after Naraku has disappeared. No weird hair demon. No Band of Seven/Shichinintai. No Mt. Hakurei. No cute scene where Inuyasha falls asleep on Kagome's bed. Just Naraku—poof!—gone! I'm kind of guessing at the amount of time that has passed, but…oh well…_

_Please enjoy!_

_Japanese Word of the Day: _yami_- darkness._

_Disclaimer: (**blows raspberry**) No, god damn it!_

_-- -- --_

**Modern Era, late May**

"It's ridiculous, what these teachers get up to! Yeah, I know, I know!"

Kagome Higurashi, sixteen years old, paced restlessly across her bedroom, running one hand through her gently waved black hair, holding a cordless phone to her ear with the other. "Oh, that's right, old Chiba assigns you guys that awful research paper as a final…but get this! I've got to do a huge family tree! No, the whole deal, trace your family back as far as you can, although, thank the gods, he lets us trace just one parent. Yeah, like I research my mom, then her dad, then her grandpa…I don't have to deal with siblings in detail, just mention their names. But it's still so stupid! I mean, there's this website that traces family history back into the 1300's! No, I can't play dumb with that one, it's one of the ones he recommended. He'll check it to see if I tried to cop out."

She paused at the foot of her pink-covered bed, tapping one finger against her leg. The faint voice on the other end of the phone chattered for a moment before her face broke out into a wry grin that lit up her large, expressive gray eyes. "Yeah, well, I'm ahead of you there. Mine's due in two weeks."

A woman's voice suddenly drifted in through the open door. "Kagome, honey, I think it's about time you said goodbye to Eri! You should do your homework!"

Sighing gustily, Kagome relayed into the phone, "Sorry, my mom wants me to abandon you for some old dead people who frankly have absolutely no influence on my life. Yeah. So, I'll see you at school? Great! Then—what? Oh, thanks! Yeah, my birthday was last week—no, it's okay, you've been sick. That's right, I'm sixteen. Hm? No, I can't drive. I got dropped out of Driver's Education because of all of my absences. Yeah, it does suck, but it may be for the best."

"Kagome!"

She shifted the mouthpiece to below her chin as she called back, "All right, Mom, just one sec!" Moving the phone back into position, she said quickly, "Sorry, Eri, I really do have to go. Oh, yeah? Great. See you Monday!"

With a sigh, she hit the 'off' button and called out, "Okay, I'm done!"

"All right. You mind if I call someone then?"

"Nope, go ahead," she responded, dropping the phone onto her bed and making her way over to her desk. Her mother's laptop sat there, a loan to Kagome so she could work undisturbed in her room. With a sigh, she flipped the top open and quickly clicked on the Internet Explorer icon. "Family history, here I come," she said with an ironic grin, plopping herself down in her chair and cracking her knuckles.

The statement really was ironic. Her family history was still a mystery to her, but the time period in which some of them had lived was not. Some strange trick of fate had landed Kagome a home in a shrine that also contained an old, dry well. Imagine Kagome's surprise when, on her fifteenth birthday, a strange demon had burst out of the well and dragged Kagome straight into the Feudal Era of Japan.

Shaking her head, Kagome found the page she had bookmarked, a brief profile of some great-grandfather of hers from the seventeenth century. Just because she knew what life was like around the beginning of the 1500s didn't mean she knew who her ancestors were…and it was the latter that she needed in order to get a decent grade in her history class.

So, with very little enthusiasm, she copied down the required information: date of birth, date of death if deceased (which this fellow most certainly was), occupation, siblings, and parents' names. After spending ten minutes reading the rather extensive life summary, she jotted down several bullet points that marked what she believed was most important or interesting—or at least what her teacher would believe was important or interesting—about his life.

Next, she clicked randomly on the link that would take her to her current subject's mother, someone named Izumi of the Makoto clan. Taking down the vital statistics, she then went on to Izumi's father, then her grandfather, then her great-grandmother…

The process continued for about an hour and a half before Kagome found herself yawning for the second time in five minutes. She glanced at the clock. _Only midnight…I should probably work a little more._ Her eyes drooped slightly. _Oh hell. I knew getting only three hours of sleep after cramming for that English test would backfire._

She sighed and stood, bookmarking her current page and shutting down the laptop. "Whatever. I'll get more done tomorrow."

With that, she strolled into her bathroom, where she splashed her face with water and ran a brush over her teeth before retreating sleepily back into her room. She was already wearing her pajamas, having taken an early shower, so she all but collapsed onto her pink comforters and wearily turned off her lamp.

"Mm…a real bed," she murmured sleepily. She glanced once at her window, whose curtains were open to let the moon shine down on her, and then closed her eyes. One breath. Two breaths. Three.

She was asleep before number four.

-- -- --

Darkness…darkness everywhere. So dark, she couldn't even see herself. Was she even _there_? Was she floating in thin air? Standing on the ground? Upside-down? Was she even wearing anything? Did it matter?

Somewhere in the distance, a spot of light appeared. It didn't illuminate anything particularly exciting, just a small patch of soft, green grass. For lack of anything more interesting, she watched it. She didn't know how long she stared before she realized that the spot was growing. The light expanded, revealing more grass, rough ground, a few small wildflowers, a butterfly, some moths, more and more that was totally and completely ordinary.

Suddenly, the light seemed to explode, swelling violently, painfully, lighting up a whole meadow. She got an impression of green, lots of green, little spots of color, dark trees in the distance, a brilliant blue sky, but she didn't see more. It was too bright, and because she still didn't know if her arms were there to throw in front of her face, she settled for squeezing her eyes shut. Assuming that her eyes were actually there.

She waited until her eyes had adjusted, and then she looked again.

Had those two tiny figures in the distance been there before?

The one on the left had long, silver hair and was wearing clothes of the brightest red. She thought she could see something tiny on the figure's head, but she couldn't be sure. But the bold colors didn't make the strongest impression; what she really felt, what really mattered, was the waves of both strength and weakness roiling around in its heart, love and hate, denial and desperation. But most of all…anxiety. Uncertainty. Fear.

The one to her right looked very strange. For some reason, even if she stared right at it, the color and design of its clothes changed constantly, from red to white to green to green and white to white and red to no real color at all, from long and elegant to short and youthful to somewhere in between. Its hair always remained black, but it billowed strangely in an unseen wind; it looked it was constantly shifting. Short and wavy? Long and straight? Straight and short? Wavy and long? Straight _and_ wavy? She couldn't tell. There was just _something_, a strange sense of familiarity, as if she should know this person, but couldn't pin his or her identity because of some small difference that made all the difference in the world.

The lonely figure reached out one hand. A male voice, rough, forlorn, angry, but not really, seemed to sound right next to her left ear. "You always…always…" A name rolled out of his mouth, a long, hesitant string of words, but as soon as her heart thrilled at hearing them, she forgot them.

The ever-changing one took a small step away from the other. "But it cannot be," it said in a soft, sad, feminine voice in her opposite ear.

The male oozed forward, was suddenly directly in front of the figure. "You're leaving?" he asked, now truly angry, but sad and scared, too.

The female figure backed away again. "Yes…yes, I'm leaving, because it cannot be," she whispered, pulling away, her clothes still flashing, her hair still fluttering. More words that were instantly lost to memory.

He whispered something…something that only the shifting figure understood. She straightened, and her voice was suddenly angry. "No!" she rapped out. "No! Don't say that! Don't lie to me!"

More words, soft words, forgotten words, unspoken words. Even though she was so far away, the female suddenly seemed to start shaking, and she turned angrily away. "No," she hissed.

And with that, the world seemed to crack open. The sky, bluer than any she had ever seen, split along a long, thin black line as jagged as a lightning bolt, and slowly turned a roiling, greenish-purplish shade of black. The earth itself groaned and buckled, and suddenly fractured, opening a cavernous gap between the two figures. The male shouted hoarsely, calling out an incomprehensible name, tried to leap the fissure, but some force held him back. The female stood, unmoving except for her clothes and hair, and watched. But above the crackling and moaning of the torn earth, her voice whispered, "I'm sorry."

"_No!_" The male tried to leap again and again, but every time, he could never make it off the ground. His ragged breathing somehow cut through the earth's rumbling, as he tried once more, twice more, threw his whole body forward in one last, desperate attempt—

He collapsed to his hands and knees, exhausted, drained, unable to do anything but stare at the other figure. "You're leaving," he whispered, no longer questioning or protesting, but accepting with a dull, crushed glaze over his voice.

There was something dark bubbling at the bottom of the rift, like lava, but darker, more sinister, less _real_. Not lava. Not anything tangible. There was hurt boiling between the two figures, forcing their sides of the chasm apart. Hurt and anger and sorrow. Despair, hatred, heartbreak, denial, terrible, terrible secrets that couldn't be told because of love. There was love there, too, but dark love, tainted love, love that could never be. There was a sense of otherworldliness, of remoteness, a simple feeling of not belonging. The sea of emotion churned and tossed in a sickly dance that continued to batter at the walls of the chasm. It sent up clouds of vile dark steam that whirled itself into shapes that were only visible for an instant. A well, a backpack, a rosary, an arrow, a sword, a mirror, a child, a jewel, so many strange things that appeared and vanished and appeared again between the figures.

"I'm sorry," repeated the female. The shifting was growing more and more rapid, the red and white and green and black blurring into a dizzying swirl of color. "It could not be."

She turned and walked away. She disappeared.

"_No! NO!_" he screamed after her, reaching out one single desperate hand, pleading, begging, but it was too late. She was gone. "Damn," he whispered. His hand slowly dropped. "Damn. God fucking, fucking, _fucking damn!_" He pounded the ground angrily, but it did no good. The sky was still dark, the earth still sported a raw, festering wound, that foul steam still billowed above the roiling pool of hurt and love. Slowly, he sank down, his forehead touching, and then heavily resting on, the grass. There was no more anger. Sadness. Hurt. Loneliness. Fear. The unbearable ache of loss. But no more anger. He didn't care anymore.

Blackness crept in again. It ate away at the upper limits of the sky, the edges of darkened meadow. Slowly it rolled its way to the lone, red figure, devouring the grass, the black heavens, the devastating rift. He was the only one left now, just him, his despair, a small patch of grass. Darkness engulfed his outstretched fist, his feet, his torso, his neck. His head, bowed in defeat, remained one last instant. "Damn it," he whispered in her ear. And then he was gone.

Her throat hurt. She was screaming. She had been screaming for a long time. And crying, too. Her face was wet. She had been screaming and crying and calling out his name as if she could single-handedly close that wide, un-crossable rift. Now, his name tore its way out of her mouth, echoing jaggedly in the black endlessness. "_Inuyasha!_" she screamed.

"_INUYASHA!_"

-- -- --

"Kagome, wake up, you damn fool! Wake up!"

Grabbing for the source of the voice like a lifeline, Kagome's fist was suddenly filled with a handful of soft, sturdy fabric. She pulled and lurched up to a seated position, breathing hard.

"Inu-Inuyasha…" she muttered, her hand twisting desperately.

"Yeah, what?"

Shrieking in surprise, she jerked away and backed up against the wall. Her mind, still fuzzy from sleep, slowly managed to process her own room, her own twisted sheets, her own window, hanging open as evidence of an unexpected intruder in the night.

Said intruder was kneeling beside her bed, a violently bright beacon of red in his crimson haori and hakama. It was the same male figure from her dream with the same long, silver hair. Up close now, she could also see golden eyes and little white dog ears on his head, labeling him as a half-demon.

But his face didn't quite match that lost, yearning voice. Instead, he was scowling the scowl of the perpetually grumpy, but something remarkably similar to distress glimmered in his eyes. "Geez, wench, I save you from a nightmare and you fucking make me go deaf in thanks?" he snapped at her, rubbing one twitching ear.

For a few moments, Kagome could only stare at him, trying to get her breathing under control, trying to process that strange, strange dream. _Two people_, she remembered. _Two people. One of them was Inuyasha. One of them was…was…and they couldn't…it couldn't be…the ground…and there was…at the bottom…he was so hurt…_ Heartbreak and anger clawed at her chest, although she found it harder and harder to remember why. She could recall…nothing…nothing but darkness and fear and love so strong that it cut like hatred. She shuddered and tried to force the thoughts away.

Finally, she managed to gather enough self-control to frown at him and ask, "Inuyasha, what the hell are you doing in my room?"

For an instant, he examined her in concern, but almost immediately he glowered back at her and barked, "You said you'd come back last night! I gave you until midnight, and then I came to get you, but of _course_ you had to be sleeping, so I couldn't wake you up without getting subdued, so I ended up spending the night in this little box you call a room!"

"I didn't say that! I said _three_ days, which means tonight, not _last_ night!" she retorted, pushing herself off of her bed and checking her reflection in a small mirror she kept on her dresser. "Ugh, look at me…"

Inuyasha's hand, rough, strong, and with fingernails long enough to be called claws, clamped around her wrist and forced the mirror away. He pushed his face in front of hers and snarled, "Pay attention! We agreed on two days!"

The proximity of his coarsely handsome face made Kagome's breath catch. "We—we did not! _You_ may have decided that, but I never made any such agreement!"

"Well, tough luck," he huffed, and dropped her wrist. Moving to the yellow backpack that sat next to her desk, he began rifling through it, asking, "Are you already packed? What the hell's with all of your school crap? Where's—oh, here. Hey, go get some more Ramen will you?"

Kagome could only stare as he tossed out all of her schoolbooks but her math and history textbooks. When he began cramming in her spare uniform, first aid kit, cups of Ramen, water heater, and tightly sealed bag of clean underwear, she finally reacted and lunged at him. "What do you think you're doing?" she hissed, tucking the bag of unmentionables behind her back, blushing furiously.

He gave her a hard stare before he said, "Packing for you. What else?"

"But _why?_" she snapped, dropping the bag and prodding him in the chest with her finger.

"Because you're coming back with me. Now."

"Why do I have to go back to the Feudal Era with you _now_? Can't fighting demons and getting Shikon shards wait for one more day?" At this, her hand automatically went to a small glass jar hanging from a chain around her neck. Clinking around inside the jar were two sharp shards of what looked like some pale pink crystal. They were all pieces of a powerful jewel known as the Shikon Jewel, a jewel that, in the hands of a demon, granted the user unbelievable strength and power. Kagome had shattered the Jewel into shards like these during her first venture into the Feudal Era, and had subsequently found herself responsible for gathering them up again with Inuyasha's aid before demons could abuse the shards' power.

"Nope," her traveling companion replied snippily, deftly reaching behind her and grabbing the bag again. "Have you forgotten? Naraku's _disappeared_. We have to find him before he can cause more trouble."

Naraku was the name of their main enemy, a half-demon like Inuyasha who, also like Inuyasha, intended to re-form the Jewel and use it to transform himself into a full-blooded demon. In their last battle with him, the day before Kagome had left for her own time, Inuyasha and his full-demon brother had managed to slice Naraku to pieces, although they were all too familiar with his power to believe him defeated. As feelings between the two brothers were less than friendly, they had parted with little ceremony, and Kagome had come back home to catch up with school and to rest a bit from all the demon hunting. Apparently, her break had come to an end.

Not that she wasn't going to fight for it. "Well, you don't exactly have any idea of where he is, do you?" she asked archly, crossing her arms.

Instead of snapping impatiently at her, Inuyasha gave her a long, serious look. "We've heard a rumor of a woman who knows something about 'the spider brand.' Remember the spider-shaped burn on Naraku's back? His mark?"

Kagome stared at him for a moment before muttering, "Give me ten minutes."

-- -- --

**Feudal Era, late May**

Kagome sighed and stretched out on her sleeping bag, shifting when she felt the many rocks on the floor of the clearing poking into her back. _Just this morning, I was sleeping in my own soft, fluffy, pink bed, _she thought mournfully. _And now…_ She impatiently pounded one fist against the dark blue, heavy-duty sleeping bag that served as her bed whenever she and her friends in the Feudal Era couldn't spend the night in an inn.

"Mm…don't hit me, Kagome," muttered a tiny boy who was curled up close to her shoulder. He was incredibly short, with odd little paws for feet, but he made up for the lack of space taken up with seemingly boundless energy. His bright orange hair and sparkling green eyes seemed to reflect that internal wellspring of life, although they may only have been side effects of his being a fox demon. He had the usual pointed ears, claws, and fangs of any full demon, as well as the tail that demons sported. His was little more than a big ball of peach-colored fuzz, but it would eventually grow into a long, elegant fox tail like those that his dead parents had sported.

Kagome smiled down at him and smoothed his hair. "Don't worry, Shippo, I won't. Go to sleep."

He nodded in drowsy agreement and almost immediately dozed off.

"Good night, Kagome."

She looked up at the speaker and found a woman a little older than she was, dressed in a yukata typical of the Feudal Era. With her hair demurely tied back, she looked rather ordinary. But a closer look revealed her strange ruby eyes, hardened muscles, and tough black gauntlets that wrapped from her elbow to a ring on each of her middle fingers.

This was Sango, a former demon slayer who had lost her entire village in one of Naraku's power-hungry schemes. Her own brother, alive only through the aid of a Shikon shard, was under Naraku's control. She worked with her only other tie to her old way of life, a demon fire cat named Kirara, who had gone off scouting for signs of Naraku. An excellent fighter, she was particularly skilled with a huge boomerang fashioned from demons' bones, her Hiraikotsu. The weapon, taller than its owner, was laid out at Sango's back, ready to be used at a moment's notice.

Sango curled up on the ground with a light blanket and smiled at Kagome. "You'd better get some rest; we've still got a long way to go if we want to reach that woman's village tomorrow."

She nodded back. "Yeah, you're right. Sleep well, Sango."

"Doesn't poor Miroku over here get any sort of acknowledgement?" asked a hurt-looking monk who had stationed himself at the base of a nearby tree. Despite his indignant pout, his violet eyes were sparkling with laughter in a face as good-looking as Inuyasha's, although in a more sophisticated way. His right arm was covered with a gauntlet similar in style to Sango's, but slightly more ornate, purple, and securely wrapped with a string of dark blue prayer beads.

The gauntlet was the only external sign of Miroku's curse: a Wind Tunnel within his hand that acted like a black hole when it was uncovered. It was a useful weapon, but the Wind Tunnel had a fatal drawback. Throughout Miroku's life, it would widen until it reached a point where it would engulf his body. The curse was Naraku's, and Miroku's goal was to kill him in order to break free.

"Not if 'poor Miroku' is going to say anything perverted," Sango retorted sharply, sending a glare his way.

Kagome laughed. Miroku was indeed a monk, and a powerful one at that, but there were times when Kagome wondered if his morals truly squared with his calling. Handsome and clever, Miroku was a skilled extortionist and an incurable womanizer. The latter he excused with his need to father a son to carry on his quest to destroy Naraku in case Miroku died first, but he was usually so flighty about the task that they all doubted his sincerity. His favorite target was Sango; he would frequently steal opportunities to give her bottom an affectionate rub, even though she always retaliated quite violently. Perhaps he chose Sango because Inuyasha had very irately and seriously threatened to kill the monk if he tried groping Kagome…but she had relatively reliable proof that Miroku had a special spot in his heart for the demon slayer.

His violet eyes sparkled in the pale starlight. "What if I _do_ something perverted without saying a word? Would that satisfy you?"

Sango blushed violently, and Kagome hid a mischievous smile. Miroku wasn't the only one she suspected of having romantic feelings. "Don't be stupid!" the demon slayer fumed at him, turning huffily away. "Good _night_."

"Ah, so I _did_ get a good night after all—ow. Sango dearest, was throwing that rock really necessary?"

She gestured rudely at him, and the exchange ended with Miroku's self-satisfied chuckles.

With a sigh, Kagome looked up into the trees, searching for the telltale red of Inuyasha's clothes. She found him perched in a tree on the opposite side of the camp, and called out, "Good night, Inuyasha."

"Keh," he snorted back. "Go to sleep."

She silently turned to the side and rested her head on her arm, Shippo having commandeered her pillow. Whatever she suspected of Miroku and Sango, Inuyasha was still a mystery. Through a long, complicated string of events, he had betrayed and had been betrayed by his former lover, Kikyou, Kagome's previous incarnation. Not long after Kagome had entered his life, Kikyou had been resurrected. She should have been happy that the two of them had a chance to reconcile; but she had two very good reasons not to be.

First off, Kikyou was determined to drag Inuyasha into death with her so they could be together forever. Not a pleasant fate for anyone.

And second…put simply, Kagome was hopelessly in love with the half-demon. He was rude, uncivilized, violent, possessive, insensitive, oblivious, and as un-romantic as they came. Yet at the same time, he was sweet, soft-hearted, protective, loyal, and incredibly courageous. There were times when Kagome wanted to use the rosary around his neck—a string of magical beads that would slam him painfully into the ground whenever she told him to 'sit'—to pound him straight into the earth and out through America.

And then there were times when he would hug her in that awkward, caring way of his, when he would half-kill himself to protect her from attacking demons, when he would confide painful memories to her, when he would just look at her with a strange, soft look in his scorching golden eyes. Times when she would be torn between an overwhelming sense of love and a cynical speculation that he was only thinking of his old lover Kikyou.

But what could Kagome do about it? For the briefest instant, she recalled her dream, or the little she had been able to hang on to throughout the long day of traveling. Loss, fear, anger, and darkness. And so much love and hurt. What did it mean?

With a sigh, she settled herself more comfortably in her sleeping bag and, pondering the long trek still ahead of them, forced herself to sleep.

Neither she nor the others ever noticed the watching eyes so malevolent that they seemed to glow in the darkness beyond the campfire's light.

_(end)_

-- -- --

_Wow. Much more description this time around. The dream was originally going to be something between Kagome and Inuyasha, but when I went back to read it…it wasn't enough. So, I decided to revamp it and have Kagome watch him interacting with someone else, and…that angsty little scene was the result._

_Anyways, I actually like this chapter. Much simpler than my weird little battle thing I had going with the original. I may actually do a little something more with the dream. You never know._

_Um…final note: I'll probably post chapters two and three at the same time, because I'm not entirely satisfied with the way I have them organized right now, which means that certain events from one chapter will probably be transferred to the other. Since that would be quite confusing for a new reader, I decided to be nice and…well, just not let things get mixed up at all._

_That's all for now! Ciao!_


	2. A Glimpse into the Future

**Blood Ties, Blood Lies**

**Chapter Two: A Glimpse into the Future**

_It's official. The old BTBL has been scrapped (please, no torture instruments!). In its place, we have a spanking_ new _BTBL with (hopefully) a much more cohesive plot and much better writing. A lot has changed and will change, so **old readers, be on the alert!** But don't worry (this comment is especially for **aradow**), the overarching plot is still the same. I'm still a mad fan of fluff, so there will be plenty of that, but hopefully this time I won't spend three chapters in a row on one single day and then suddenly jump two months into the future._

_Wanna hear a secret? (**whispers**) I actually intend to write a real story this time, not a fic that's fifty percent filler! (**GASP!!**)_

_Also, from here on out, I will be using Japanese honorifics with the characters' names, since a lot about their relationships with each other can be inferred from a simple "-chan" or "-sama." If I use one incorrectly, please feel free to correct me!_

_Japanese Word of the Day:_ yogen –_ prophecy._

_Disclaimer: No. For this and all future chapters of BTBL, the Inu-tachi, Naraku-tachi, and assorted other characters from the Inuyasha series are not and never will be my property. (**sniffle**) So sad._

-- -- --

**Feudal Era, late May**

After a lifetime of practice, Miroku had perfected what Sango cynically called his all-knowing-monk gaze, a thoughtful, dignified, penetrating stare he often put on when first walking into a village. It had served him well, he found, to immediately reveal his status as a powerful young monk. Not only did people respect him more, but they tended to loosen their suspicion of strangers around virtuous men such as he—_Kagome-sama and Sango would die of laughter if they heard that_, he reflected with a sardonic grin—making them that much more susceptible to some good-natured swindling of money, food, or women. Or any combination of the three.

Today, however, was an exception. Today's all-knowing-monk gaze was fully intended to be just that: an alert appraisal of the small, bustling village that lay before him and his companions. Yes, his eyes might possibly have strayed the few times a particularly well-rounded young lady had entered his field of vision, but all in all, his relative success in maintaining focus pleased him.

Unfortunately, the others were too focused themselves to notice his good behavior. He let his eyes skitter back towards the group before sighing at his unnoticed achievement and returning to his perusal of the village. Inuyasha, of course, probably could care less. The half-demon knew him too well, choosing to save his energy and not bother to scold Miroku for his kimono-chasing, as Kagome loved to call it, unless others picked up on it first. It happened too often for Inuyasha to muster up the initiative every time.

And besides, just now, the half-demon was too preoccupied with the village before them to really pay attention to anything else. His stance was tense and alert, and he gripped his sword, the Tessaiga, with one tight-knuckled hand. The monk noted with exasperated amusement that his friend had automatically positioned himself in front of Kagome as an aggressive living shield.

_How long will this little charade last?_ he silently asked Inuyasha, studying the villagers' movements for anything suspicious. _It is already obvious to everyone how defensive you are of her. How long before you realize _why_ you are so protective?_

It frustrated him to no end that Inuyasha was truly so dense. But at the same time, it was understandable. Kikyou, the woman who Inuyasha had loved, lost, and recovered through a tangled, heartbreaking series of events, held a strong grip over Inuyasha even fifty years after their romance had been tragically cut short. An idiot like him, when pulled between love for two women, would always go for Kikyou: the woman who wouldn't reject him. The woman who needed him. The woman who loved him.

It was really too bad that Inuyasha didn't know that those criteria fit Kagome just as well, if not better.

Kagome, holding Shippou in her arms, was chewing nervously on her lip. The group's rough morning showed in the bags under her eyes; grotesque demons of unnamable variety had roused them from sleep a solid hour before dawn, and their sheer numbers had kept them busy for many hours after that. The sun was already high overhead by the time Kagome's arrows, Miroku's Kazaana and ofuda, Sango's Hiraikotsu, Inuyasha's Kaze no Kizu, and the return of the fierce Kirara had killed them all.

He shook his head. It was troubling, this sudden surge of second-rate demons that had begun ever since Naraku's disappearance. Naraku's demonic power had grown strong enough that most small-time demons had chosen to lay low; the fading of Naraku's aura had emboldened such demons beyond anything the young monk had ever seen in his life.

The trying day had not stopped with victory over the demons. Kagome and Inuyasha had once again managed to start squabbling with each other, the subject of useless arrows somehow morphing into Kagome accusing Inuyasha of wishing that she were Kikyou instead of herself. The comment had struck a deep nerve in them both, and they had barely spoken for the rest of the day.

But now that the village of the woman they had heard rumors of was in sight, they had wordlessly established some semblance of a truce. Inuyasha had moved to protect her, and she willingly accepted, her fingers tense on the wood of her bow, but with anxiety, not with anger. So they had made up. Perhaps fear and nervousness were good for something after all.

He heard Sango shift slightly as a single figure from the village below purposefully made its way to their little band. Typical Sango. Always ready. Always on the alert. Always strong and ready to fight.

Despite his apprehension, he studied her from the corner of his eye. She never failed to take his breath away. Women like her—tough, reliable, kind, loyal women—didn't belong in this imperfect world, in the presence of imperfect men like him. Women like her didn't deserve the suffering she had gone through at Naraku's hands: the death of her kinsmen, the loneliness that so often accompanied lone survivors, and the pain of her own little brother's enslavement under Naraku. Women like her simply didn't exist.

And women like her certainly would never be his.

With a sigh, Miroku pulled his eyes away from the tense Sango, re-focusing himself on the approaching figure that he now recognized as the village headman. They had called for the man upon reaching the village, deciding that it would be safer to wait on the outskirts while he fetched the woman they had heard rumors of. And now, he was returning alone. Was that a good sign?

Perhaps. The middle-aged man looked a bit tired, but less cautious than he had been when first speaking with them. With a nod to each of the travelers, he bowed slightly and began, "I apologize for forcing you to wait for so long, but it took some time before her husband would approve."

"Her husband?" Kagome asked, raising an eyebrow at the headman. "You mean he has the authority to dictate who may or may not see his wife?"

There was ice in her voice; Kagome had never approved of the authority husbands often held over their wives, which puzzled Miroku somewhat. Yes, some men took things too far, but if a wife did not obey her husband to some degree, protecting and providing for her became not only difficult, but also unrewarding, and most sensible husbands—forget husbands, people in general—didn't like going unappreciated.

Then again, Kagome had always had some very strange ideas that were probably peculiar to her time. It was only natural for her to see the traditions she had grown up with as the right ones.

Strange as her disapproval was, the headman seemed to understand, and he bowed again, deeper this time. "Begging your pardon, honored traveler; I did not mean to offend. The woman you are asking after, Hanako-san, is in no fit condition to govern herself, and so her husband has taken it upon himself to attend to her needs and her safety."

Miroku could see Inuyasha bristle slightly and felt a fleeting desire to do the same. The way he had added "safety" seemed to imply that they were a danger to the indisposed Hanako, an obvious insult to travelers under any circumstances. But his fear was in a way justified. Naraku's disappearance had initiated a huge surge in demon attacks. The bloodshed and villages' weakened defenses caused by demons had in turn lured out bandits and worse. How were simple villagers to know if a suspicious group like his wished them ill or not? Instead, Miroku bowed in return, drawing the man's attention away from his half-demon friend.

"Offend? Not at all. Then, if all is in order, may we meet Hanako-dono?" he graciously prodded. He heard a soft growl at his words, but it hadn't been Inuyasha who had found offense. Sneaking a glance as he straightened again, Miroku suppressed a grin at the warning glare Sango had leveled at him. _Don't you dare try anything funny, monk_, her eyes warned him.

Even under the tensest circumstances, some things never changed.

-- -- --

"We must look so peculiar to the poor villagers," Kagome confided to Shippou as he clung to her hair.

The young fox demon looked up at her. Seeing her from this vantage point, cradled gently against her chest, was something unique to his relationship with Kagome. Not even his own dam had carried him this way very often, preferring to press him to walk on his own and to quickly become a man she could be proud of.

And yet there were times when Shippou could see a fleeting resemblance between Kagome and Mama. The warmth in their eyes—one pair gray and familiar, one pair fiery green and existing only in his memories—was the same. The way they rushed to protect him, the way they took secret joy in spoiling him rotten: they were the same.

There had also been times when Shippou briefly thought that he might be in love with Kagome. She was one of the prettiest women he had ever known, and one of the kindest as well. But, beauty or no, Kagome was simply too old, too motherly, and too in love with Inuyasha for Shippou to love that way.

_And thank goodness_, he thought with a mental grin. _Inuyasha would tear me apart if I were in love with her. Especially since she lets _me_ share her sleeping bag._

No, most of the time, Shippou didn't see Kagome as a mother or as a love interest. He didn't see her as a sister, although he certainly thought he was her family in some weird way, and he didn't see her solely as a friend. He saw Kagome for what she truly was.

Kagome was a sweet girl, a kind girl. The kind of girl who would take a bitter, insolent brat into her arms with no thought for reward. The kind of girl who would rush to shield him from a fire that would surely kill them both. The kind of girl who loved Inuyasha despite all of his idiocy.

In short, Kagome was an angel.

Shippou smiled to himself and snuggled closer to her. He didn't know how he'd found the good fortune to be so close to someone so perfect, but he wasn't about to let a second with her pass without milking it for all it was worth.

"I mean, think about it," she was saying to him, looking around and meeting the eyes of a few wary villagers. "A girl all dressed up in modern era clothes, a half-demon, a monk, a fox kit, and a demon slayer, all in one group. Even to me, there's something peculiar about this picture."

"Ah, they don't matter, Kagome," he assured her, deciding to clamber up onto her shoulder. That way, he got a better view, and would be able to react faster in case Kagome needed defending. Never mind that fact that his legs trembled at the very thought of such a situation. "_We're_ okay with each other, right? Well, most of the time."

She chuckled and gently tapped her head against his. "Most of the time, yes. Although I still think we're all pretty weird in our own ways."

In protest, Shippou tickled her neck, making her squirm to suppress a giggle. But before he could say or do more, the village headman leading the group suddenly stopped in front of a perfectly ordinary-looking hut. Kagome's hand went to Shippou's shoulder, whether to comfort him or quiet him he wasn't sure. Whatever her reasons, Shippou always interpreted the touch as a signal to be as unobtrusive as possible, so he sat back and watched as the headman gestured for their group to stay put. Alone, the wrinkly man approached the hut, calling out, "Hiro-san! The travelers are here to see your wife. Is she fit to greet them?"

There was a pause before a tired man's voice answered, "In all honesty, I wonder if she has ever been _less_ fit…but she seems calm, yes. We'll be out in a moment."

Shippou heard Kagome's breathing hitch nervously as the screen across the door shifted slightly. A relatively young man with nothing out of the ordinary about him—worn robes, topknot, and all—poked his head out and said to them, "Honored travelers, please do not think less of either of us when you see my wife. Hanako…is not well, and one man can only do so much when he attempts to farm, keep house, and care for his wife all at once." He tiredly rubbed his face. "Despite my increased responsibilities, she will tolerate no one's aid except my own."

Kagome leaned forward curiously, and Miroku nodded at the villager. "Of course, Hiro-dono," he said to the tired-looking man. "Please, we feel that your wife could provide us with some valuable aid. We will not judge." Kagome nodded emphatically with Miroku's words.

Looking skeptically at them all, Hiro ducked back in, and then pushed the screen back entirely. He and a haggard woman who must have been pretty once exited, his arm around her waist, both supporting her and dragging her forward.

"…her eyes," Sango whispered, quietly enough that only Inuyasha and Shippou with their sensitive ears heard her. "Look at her eyes."

Shippou looked and almost instantly regretted it. Although Hanako's eyes were deeply set and shadowed from lack of sleep, they sparkled with wildfire and drew him in like the black, whirling night sky that lay between the stars. He shuddered and buried his face in Kagome's hair. "I don't like her," he whimpered, fisting his small, barely clawed hands in her somewhat tangled locks. "She's scary."

"She's not scary, Shippou-chan," she breathed back, patting his back. "She's just…strange."

Shippou forced himself to look again, peeking out from behind a black curtain of hair. "But…her eyes, Kagome…" Her twin brown orbs were oddly empty, staring blankly past their faces as she made small, meaningless gestures with her hands. She seemed nothing short of insane.

"Hanako-dono…" Kagome stepped forward. She handed a cringing Shippou to Miroku, who placed the boy on his shoulder, and stepped toward the strange woman, her hands outstretched and her voice gentle enough to charm a rabbit out of its hole. "We have heard of you, Hanako-dono. Do you know anything of the mark of a spider, or a half-demon named Naraku? If you do, could you please tell us? It would be very helpful." Slowly, Kagome took one of Hanako's slightly twitchy hands, holding it between hers and smiling soothingly. "Can you help us?"

Something seemed to light up in Hanako's eyes, and her haggard, remote gaze slowly settled on Kagome, and then moved across the others. Shippou shuddered and turned away when she looked at him, but she didn't seem to mind, or even notice at all. He felt Miroku's muscles shift as the monk adjusted his grip on his staff, preparing for the worst. That was one of his best-kept secrets: easy-going as he might appear, Miroku was constantly on his guard.

But now…what was he on guard against?

The fox demon shook like a leaf and clenched in his fists in an effort to hold back his fear.

Suddenly, she spoke, and Shippou felt Miroku stiffen. "The Spider Brand…" Hanako whispered in a frail, distant voice, raspy from disuse. "The Spider Brand…the time comes when the spider must be crushed."

Shippou chanced a look at the woman and saw her pulling away from her husband and from Kagome, her eyes fixed on some point in the air far above and behind their heads. Her voice gained strength as she continued in that vague way of hers, "He takes the gods' greatest secret and makes it his own. The gods are angry. Too long, they say, too long have they permitted this perversion of the natural order to continue. The spider must be crushed, they say, but they cannot do it alone. He is too powerful. He holds too much knowledge of the working of the spirits. Only a mortal has the power to defeat him. A mortal. A savior. A chosen one."

Her formerly dull eyes, now sparkling with an unnerving fire, swept across the group, seeming to see right past their faces and into their very thoughts. "A savior will come. A savior has been called. A mortal, a child of both heaven and hell, who knows kindness most tender and pain most cruel. A mortal, a savior, the only one with the power to crush the spider, will come."

Hanako closed her eyes and turned slowly, her movements now totally calm and in control, her voice even and commanding, her very presence imparting some power beyond anything Shippou had ever experienced. Kagome backed up until she stood at Inuyasha's side, and even Hiro moved slightly away. There was no doubt. Hanako did not only speak _of_ the gods. She spoke _as_ the gods.

"A word of warning to pass to the savior," she breathed to the empty sky, her eyes still closed. "Deep, troubling times will come. Strength will be tested, determination strained, and the spirit pushed to its limits. False aid will come, poised to attack when the heart is unsuspecting and tender. False enemies will be marked, and trust will face its greatest test."

Her eyes opened, and although Shippou was sure that she wasn't looking at anyone in particular, she somehow seemed to stare every one of them directly in the eyes, a chilling wisdom in her formerly clouded gaze. "The heart and mind are treacherous beings," she cautioned them. "Mindless emotion and unfeeling thought create illusions to fool even the gods. Friendships and alliances will waver, and logic will turn to madness."

Suddenly, Hanako's eyelids began to flutter tiredly, and the strange, otherworldly look to her eyes began to fade. Her mouth opened and closed as she swayed side to side, trying to force out a last few words. Hiro was instantly at her side, holding her upright but looking apprehensively at his wife's face. "All…" she whispered, her voice once again becoming raspy. "All…is not as it seems."

With that, all of her strength seemed to leave her, and she collapsed into Hiro's arms. The surprised and concerned cry he uttered as her body went limp seemed to echo in the profound silence that followed her strange declaration. Shippou was afraid to move, afraid to shatter the awed tension in the air.

It was Hiro who finally broke it, giving them an awkward half-bow and then carrying his wife back into the house. All of their eyes followed the couple until the entrance curtain fell, leaving Hanako and Hiro in privacy and the others seemingly barricaded outside.

"Thank you…Hiro-dono and Hanako-dono," Miroku belatedly called out, finally snapping them out of their reverie. Kagome and Sango were eyed each other uneasily, and Inuyasha huffed, staring off into the distance. Miroku's empty left hand rose of its own accord to softly stroke Shippou's hair, a comforting gesture that the fox demon had long outgrown. Miroku, who of course had once been Shippou's age, was usually careful to respect Shippou's boyish pride. But by forgetting, he signified that he was in deep thought, so Shippou graciously chose not to complain.

It was the headman, overlooked until now, who finally shattered the awkward silence and timidly offered, "Honored travelers…if you have found all you wished to find, will you move on, or will you be requiring lodgings for the night?"

All five of them jumped at the sound of his voice. Miroku, as always the first to recover from shocks such as these, glanced at the others and then smiled at the older man. "A room or two would be deeply appreciated. We grow weary of camping amongst the rocks and shrub alongside the forest path."

"Of course." The headman, who had looked deeply troubled by the appearance of demons, strangely dressed girls, and a world of other things he didn't understand, seemed glad to have achieved some sense of normalcy. He bowed to them and bid them, "Of course, you must stay at my home; the largest in the village. Please, come with me."

But while he seemed to have recovered from Hanako's strange pronouncement, the rest were still uneasy, so the walk to the headman's home was for once silent, lacking the banter, arguments, and discussion they were accustomed to. Instead, troubled silence hung over their group, somehow magnified by the village bustle and the other familiar sounds of what should have been an ordinary mission.

-- -- --

"'The time comes when the spider must be crushed,'" Sango heard Kagome recite the third time in a row. "'He takes the gods' greatest secret and makes it his own. The gods are angry.'"

The atmosphere in the room they had been given was tense, to say the least. Every last one of them was unnerved by the strange Hanako, troubled by her rant that seemed nothing short of prophecy, and above all frustrated that she hadn't presented any clues to Naraku's hiding place. The demon slayer gritted her teeth as Kagome, Miroku, and Shippou went back and forth, trying to burn Hanako's words into their memories. Although Sango could understand why—they had all had heard a strange urgency in the woman's voice—it certainly got on one's nerves after a time.

Inuyasha seemed particularly irritable. The half-demon sat silently against a wall, his head bowed and his sword held close to his chest. However, his ears were swiveling wildly in agitation, and his expression was tight.

Really, none of them were at peace. Kagome, Miroku, and Shippou were talkative, open types—so they dealt with their discomfort by talking. Sango herself was meticulously checking the condition of her Hiraikotsu, perusing the whole length of bone, a full arm length longer than she was tall, for scratches, dents, and even smudges of dirt. Poor Inuyasha was a man of action; he was very likely wishing for some demons to appear so he could work off some stress.

"A savior…" Kagome said thoughtfully. "Let's assume that Hanako-dono wasn't simply acting crazy back there and actually said something worth listening to. Remember when she said, 'A word of warning to pass to the savior'? Does that make us messengers to the savior? Or"—she cast her eyes around the room, looking at every one of her friends—"does that make one of _us_ this chosen one?"

"Keh." Inuyasha opened one eye to glare at her. "Who cares? No matter who this savior is, whether or not he exists, it doesn't mean I'm going to stop hunting Naraku! I could care less about 'the chosen one.' Naraku _will _die."

Sango set down Hiraikotsu on the floor before her, absentmindedly fiddling with a rag she reserved for polishing her weapons. "Hanako-dono…she said the savior would be a child of heaven and of hell, didn't she? To me, that seems to imply…"

Four curious gazes turned to Inuyasha, and his still-closed eye opened wide. "What?"

"It makes sense," Miroku murmured. "Heaven would probably imply humans, and hell the demon race. You are a child of both. And you are mortal. And I _know_ you won't argue with the fact that you're strong enough to fight Naraku."

"Well, yeah, but…" The half-demon's protest trailed off into nothing as he stared self-consciously down at the Tessaiga. His voice was surprisingly small when he said half-bitterly, half-wonderingly, "The chosen one? Me? You've got to be kidding."

Sango caught Kagome looking at Inuyasha with a strange light her gray eyes before the girl from the future suddenly stood and announced, "Well, this isn't something we can just make a flash decision on. It has to be thought about carefully. In the meantime, I'm going to go find some water to brush my teeth with, and then I'm going to bed."

She was about to protest Kagome's abrupt change of subject when she noticed the younger girl's hand softly brush Inuyasha's shoulder as she passed him. Although the contact was light and lasted only a moment, Inuyasha visibly relaxed.

_I see. This talk is troubling Inuyasha, and Kagome-chan wanted to give him time to mull it over for himself. Besides, today was a tense day; we deserve some rest._ A smile flitted across Sango's lips. _I guess they forgot about that fight they had this morning._

"I'll go with you, Kagome-chan," Sango announced, standing and picking up the Hiraikotsu to place with the rest of their belongings. "I'd like to wash up a bit before bed, for lack of a proper bath."

Unfortunately, the route she had taken took Sango right past Miroku, and he reached out to touch her arm as she passed. The instant of contact had an immediate effect on her, like Kagome's touch had had on Inuyasha, although she certainly didn't feel relaxed. Instead, she stiffened, her awareness of danger instantly jangling like a warning bell.

"Be careful out there, Sango-sama," he cautioned her, somewhat ironically as he'd already set all of her senses on full alert. "With Naraku missing and so many more lesser demons around, we must all be extra cautious."

Even though the more reasonable part of her mind was shouting that this was only friendly advice, Sango couldn't help but feel flattered that he worried about her. Instantly, she shook the feeling away and then turned to face Miroku, rolling up her right sleeve. As she always did when they were out on potentially dangerous missions, she wore black gauntlets that extended from a ring on each of her middle fingers to her elbows. Under the seemingly flimsy black leather, there was a layer of flexible, armor-like hide taken from the skins of demon reptiles.

Sango pressed her fingers down on her right gauntlet, drawing the fabric tight against a blade concealed between the armor and leather. That was only one of the many weapons she had concealed under her clothes. She even had a needle that could be thrown like a dart hidden her hair. "Never forget, houshi-sama. I am a demon slayer. I'm always cautious."

He smiled at her, and as hard as she tried, she couldn't keep a small piece of her mind from sliding into idiotic bliss. "Believe me, I could never forget."

An instant later, Sango stiffened. She should have been ready. She should have known. What ever had happened to "senses on full alert?" Was she just a fool…or was it…

Before she could complete the thought, her hand snapped out of its own accord, the sharp sting of angry demon slayer's palm meeting perverted monk's cheek clearing her mind of anything but anger. Miroku's face was frozen in an expression of bliss and his hand in the gesture of cupping her butt as he fell to the floor from the force of the blow.

"Will you ever develop any sense of propriety, houshi-sama?" she hissed at him, lightly rubbing her tingling palm against her apron skirt. "I wonder sometimes if you possess any sort of soul at all, so easily tossing out words that make women think you actually care! And then…!"

With a huff, she whirled around and marched toward the door, leaving the pervert twitching on the floor. "Well, Kagome-chan?" she asked harshly. "Shall we go? It would be a good idea for us to remain cautious and make sure neither of us is left alone with this…thing." She gestured disdainfully at the pile of black and purple robes on the ground.

Kagome heaved a despondent sigh and nodded. She caught up with Sango, a basket of "toiletries" in her hand and an exasperated expression on her face. The moment Kagome drew even with Sango, she set out again, fuming under her breath.

"Stupid houshi-sama…almost a year together and still he hasn't grown any wiser about women at all. Who does he think I am, a common whore throwing myself at his feet for the 'pleasure' of his swindling, two-faced company? Doesn't he see…doesn't he realize…ugh, can't he tell that being groped by a pervert looking for passing pleasures isn't what I want?"

"You know, Sango-chan," Kagome commented, sifting through her basket and bringing out a peculiar object she called a toothbrush, "if Miroku-sama hasn't wisened up about women, don't you think you should enlighten him?" She met her friend's eyes with a suspiciously nonchalant smile. "If he doesn't know what you want, why don't you tell him yourself?"

Sango snorted and reached back to untie the ribbon that held her hair in a ponytail of sorts. She ran her fingers through the released tresses and replied, "And risk him completely taking advantage of the opportunity, as he always has done and always will? Certainly not!"

"How can you be so sure that that's what he'll do?" Kagome shot back, her eyes suddenly glittering with a peculiar brand of excitement that Sango had learned to dread. "Are you _really _sure of that? And are you sure that you really know what _you_ want?"

"And what is that supposed to mean, Kagome-chan?" she asked snippily, speeding up when she felt her cheeks begin to heat of their own accord. _Please, not this again…_

"What if what you want is what Miroku-sama is already giving you"—glancing from side to side for eavesdroppers, Kagome caught up and said in a loud whisper—"and more?"

Desperate to escape the conversation, Sango almost cried with relief when the well came into view. She sped up even more and quickly drew up a bucket of water, immediately scrubbing at her face and thus rendering herself incapable of holding a conversation. Unfortunately, the gesture only seemed to encourage Kagome. The younger of the two sidled up to her friend and murmured, "I'll admit, he is being entirely inappropriate. But could it be that you want to have 'that' conversation with him that will make his groping you appropriate?"

"I don't know what you're talking about, Kagome-chan!" Sango said loudly, fumbling as she tried to retie her hair. "Houshi-sama's lecherous habits are and always will be completely inappropriate! Why would I ever accept them? I swear, someday I'll make him realize that they aren't ever going to get him anywhere—"

"Ah-ha!" Kagome's basket came precariously close to spilling all over the ground as she lunged for Sango, her eyes glinting half-teasingly, half-maliciously. "'Aren't ever going to get him anywhere', hm? So if he stopped groping you and flirting with every pretty face he comes across, would that finally get him somewhere? Where would that somewhere be, hm, Sango-chan? Are you saying that if he quits his kimono-chasing, you would—"

Kagome's attack abruptly stopped, and Sango let out a relieved sigh. She was about to deny everything Kagome had implied in as dignified a manner as possible when she realized that her friend's suddenly wide eyes were fixed on some point past Sango's shoulder. "Kagome-chan?" She turned to see what had interrupted their conversation and gasped. "Oh…Kagome-chan…"

A vaguely reptilian, somewhat bug-like creature glowing with an unearthly light wove its way through the air, its six spider-like legs clutching a glowing ball of light to its belly. As the two young women watched, the intruder flew towards the headman's home.

"It's one of Kikyou's soul stealers. Coming for Inuyasha. Sango-chan, you go back…I think I'll stay out here for a while," suggested Kagome, abruptly turning away and speaking in a strained voice. "Can you…will let me know when it's…okay to come back?"

Sango silently finished tying her hair and murmured, "Of course, Kagome-chan…but you never know. He might not—"

"Inuyasha? Not see Kikyou?" Kagome laughed sarcastically at the prospect. Without turning to face Sango, she walked back to the well and placed her hands upon the edge, leaving forward slightly and gazing into its depths. "Please…just let me know once he's gone."

Sango nodded and began walking back to the room. As she headed toward the house, she heard Kagome softly whisper, "I don't think I can bear watching him leave me one more time."

_He_ shouldn't_ be leaving you_, Sango fumed, stomping angrily down the passage leading to their lodgings for the night. _Who is it who has been supporting him, without question, without hesitation, for more than a year now? Who is it who wishes most for his happiness, even if it means giving him up? You, Kagome-chan! It's you who always trusted him and always bore him up when times got rough! What kind of gratitude is this?_

"If anything"—she hissed to herself—"Kagome-chan is the one who ought to be leaving Inuyasha."

_(end)_

-- -- --

_And there you have it. Chapter two. I truly, deeply hope that all readers liked it and, almost more importantly, that old readers thought it better than the original chapter two._

_Anyways, let's ramble for a bit! During my loooong absence, I got into The Prince of Tennis! I'm not really sure why I like it, but it may be because of the characters. PoT is a sports manga, and it focuses singularly on tennis, so you'd think that there'd be no room for character development, right? Wrong! Somehow, Takeshi Konomi makes it work! And it's just so amazing! You even start rooting for rival schools (I'm a fan of Hyoutei, myself). I dunno. It's just awesome._

_And don't even get me started on the musicals! (**fans self**) Gorgeous actors galore! People like Shirota Yuu, Aiba Hiroki, Katou Kazuki, KENN--_

_Okay, if I don't stop right there, I never will. So I will conclude. First, I hope you liked! Second, read PoT if you get the chance! (try thespectrum(dot)net: she has scanlations for all 35 currently existing volumes, and rotates through them ten at a time every three or four days or so...and hurry! I think the first ten books just came back up today (Thursday)!)_


	3. Some Time Apart

**Blood Ties, Blood Lies**

**Chapter Three: Some Time Apart**

_Sorry it took so long…I had almost the whole chapter written, and then I lost the flash drive that I have literally _everything_ on. And since I last backed up my flash drive on my computer in January…I lost a lot. So again, sorry, but on top of school, there was really nothing I could do about it._

_Oh well. This way, at least, I might be able to write an even better chapter!_

_And a question for readers! In the Japanese version, how do the main characters address Kaede? Kaede-sama? Kaede-obaa-san? Baba (in Inuyasha's case, I guess)? If you know, please tell me!_

_Japanese Word of the Day:_ kyuukei – _a break or a rest_

-- -- --

**Feudal Era, Late May**

Inuyasha liked tangible things. He liked demons because he could see them, fight them, defeat them. He liked feeling the wind rush past his face when he ran quickly enough for the world around him to blur into indistinct patches of color and sound. He liked that warm smell that was a unique combination of his and his friends' personal scents.

What he didn't like was nameless danger lurking in the shadows. He didn't like empty gestures. He didn't like problems that couldn't be confronted and overcome with pure will. And, above all, he didn't like words.

Well, sure, he _used_ words, but what good were words when it was so easy to speak falsely or to hear the wrong thing?

Action. Solid things that definitely existed in the mortal world. Things that had real meaning. Only those, in his mind, mattered.

That was why Inuyasha normally liked walls and barriers. They could be frustrating as hell, yeah. But every wall has a weak spot. Every barrier has a flaw that can be hammered at until it shatters. Even perfect barriers can be broken as long as the invader is strong enough.

But not this wall.

With an angry huff, the half-demon batted a leafy branch out of his face. He was comfortably sprawled out on a tree limb high above the ground, his back supported by the thick trunk, one foot carelessly dangling in the air. He hugged Tessaiga to his chest to prevent it from catching on the many smaller twigs surrounding him. The moon glittered on the leaves' smooth surfaces, gilding them with silver and scattering scraps of light over his red-clothed form.

_This is fucking stupid_, he thought with a scowl, feeling confusion and irritation battling for supremacy in his mind. How could this be possible? How was it possible to try to think about something…and have your mind meet some kind of wall that simply wouldn't let you? And how would it be possible to take a sword to _that_ kind of wall?

Tightening his arms around Tessaiga, he stared off into the night sky visible between dark sprays of leaves. He had never really noticed the wall. Not until tonight. Before, whenever his mind had balked at looking beyond the wall, he'd shrugged it off. Most of the time, he didn't really _want_ to think about what lay on the other side anyways.

But for some reason, tonight he had noticed. And rather than being secretly relieved, he had gotten pissed off.

Maybe this business with the wall had been different tonight because…well, just about everything else that had happened that day had been different already; why not add one more thing to the list?

When had all the strangeness started? That morning? Maybe. For once, Kagome had actually forgotten herself enough to drag Kikyou's name into an argument. Most of the time, the two of them simply danced around the issue (his ears flattened at the idea of calling Kikyou an "issue"). But today, Kagome had sunken in with both teeth and refused to let go until she was close to tears.

_Stupid thing to do, too,_ he thought, shifting uncomfortably on the tree branch. The moon, having reached its peak and now beginning its descent into the great waters in the distance, seemed to stare disapprovingly at him. _We both know it only upsets her when we talk about Kikyou. Why did she have to bring her up at all, especially when we were already so pissed off?_

And later that day had come Hanako's warning. Hanako's…prophecy.

Inuyasha shuddered, then automatically looked around with self-conscious golden eyes. Another that he didn't like: the spirit world. When he had looked into Hanako's eyes and seen the gods gazing back at him, looking deep into abandoned corners of his soul that even he hadn't known existed, he had almost panicked. Gods—_true _gods—could not be killed. They couldn't be argued with. Before the gods, mortals like him were powerless, and he _hated_ being powerless. And then, when stupid Sango had put out the idea that maybe _he_ was the chosen one that Hanako had been talking about…

_It's a stupid idea. For fuck's sake, I'm just a half-demon! The gods didn't bother protecting me when I was an orphaned little brat. As if they'd suddenly start caring enough to make me their _savior, he mused bitterly, feeling the last word flare with a scornful burst of light as he thought it.

And, just when he'd thought the day couldn't get any stranger, one of Kikyou's soul stealers had shown up. Not that he hadn't been expecting it. Kikyou would have been able to figure out that he had been involved in Naraku's disappearance and would have tracked him here. Not only had she done that; she said she had also sensed a disturbance in the space that existed between the mortal and spirit worlds. That, he assumed, meant that she had somehow sensed Hanako's strange behavior as well.

None of that had really come as a surprise. That was simply how Kikyou was. Somehow, she always knew what was going on. Somehow, she was always one step ahead of him. He had come to expect that.

But when he had gone to meet her, his gut churning uncomfortably with guilt as always, things had not quite gone normally. Sure, they had discussed Naraku, offering each other whatever information they had. As usual, Kikyou had reminded him in that subtle yet painfully blunt way of hers of the promise he had made to follow her into hell once Naraku was dead.

But something extra had happened this time. Something that had never happened before. Something they had come so close to doing so many times…

He felt his cheeks flush with a shamed, guilty heat, and he briskly launched himself out of the tree, bursting through a layer of leaves into the moonlit night and landing assuredly on his feet. That thing that had happened with Kikyou…"that" was probably why the wall had suddenly started bothering him tonight. After the two of them had finally parted company that night, the atmosphere between them charged with even more tension than usual, his mind had fallen into a storm of angry self-reprieves and guilty retorts:

_What do you think you're _doing?_ Have you forgotten that there are _two_ women you're supposed to be looking out for? Even if you aren't much of a thinker, when dealing with this you _can't_ just rush in and do whatever the hell you feel like doing at the moment! You have to actually _consider_ your actions, or else you end up doing things like this! Ever consider you might have ended up _hurting_ someone tonight because you were being a stupid ass?_

And up popped the wall. Somehow, he'd found himself thinking, _Why the hell does it matter if I just do what I want?_ Almost immediately, some long-forgotten, sentimental part of his mind that was apparently horrified that he would dare to think such a thing angrily reprimanded him, _Because I'm responsible! I owe her…I owe them both! And one of them will end up hurt._

_But why should you care if one ends up hurt?_ a voice seemed to whisper to him. _Only one really matters to you…_

Inuyasha had wanted to somehow retort to that voice, but he found his mind wandering in circles. After all, didn't the voice have a point? He could only choose one, so only one really mattered…

He shook his head as he tucked the Tessaiga back into the waist of his hakama. He had a strong, but somehow indefinable feeling that those thoughts were just _wrong_…but, in that case, what was _right_?

_That_, he was sure, was what lay behind the wall, but some reason he simply couldn't get himself past it. He had the strangest feeling that something _big_ would happen if he crossed it. There would be some huge, unfathomable change in his life if he broke through…and it probably wouldn't be a good one.

"This is _stupid_," Inuyasha told himself, locating the distant human-and-fire scent characteristic of any village. He set off at a run towards the village, muttering curses under his breath. Why did he deserve all of this trouble anyways? Sure, he'd been one hell of an asshole in this life…but his only crime had been his lack of trust in Kikyou those many years ago.

'_Only?'_ a sarcastic voice in his mind scoffed. _That lack of trust ended up _killing_ her! After claiming that you loved her, after hearing her pledge her life to you, you still were so stupid and distrustful that you didn't even stop to think when Naraku disguised himself as her! 'Your _only_ crime?' Don't make me laugh!_

Inuyasha gritted his teeth and forced himself to run faster, faster, faster, so fast that the roar of the wind rushing past him drowned out that nasty, confident voice. _I _know_ that,_ he replied angrily. _I may be one hell of an idiot, but I _know._ It was _my_ lack of faith that ended up killing Kikyou. It was all my fault that she died. It's my fault that things ended up all screwed up this way._

He was starting to lose his breath, yet he kept running at a breakneck speed, sensing and dodging obstacles more by instinct rather than by sight. Inuyasha could feel his thoughts settle into that timeworn cycle that wound endlessly between guilt and hope, between yearning for the past and hopes for the future, between the two women that both built up his world and tore his mind to pieces.

Kagome and Kikyou. There shouldn't have been any choice. He ought to have chosen Kikyou without a second thought. He _loved_ her, curse it! Didn't that mean he would automatically choose her above all other things?

But life could never be that fucking easy, could it? No, it couldn't. Fate simply _had_ to toss a girl at him who didn't know how to take care of herself and whose need for protection he simply couldn't make himself ignore, not even for Kikyou's sake. And of course she simply had to be the selfless type who kept saying that it was his own choice to make, that he _should_ go to Kikyou, even though they both knew that she would become some bloodthirsty demon's meal the second he turned his back on her.

But the worst part of it all was that although he _knew_ that he should resent Kagome for making life so difficult for him, he simply _couldn't_ resent her, because her mere presence somehow made the world seem a little simpler. A little brighter. A little cleaner. Just…a better place to be.

That effect of hers certainly wasn't tangible, but it was one of the few intangible things in his life that he actually liked.

Obeying some internal signal, Inuyasha came to a halt, panting and wiping a bead of nervous sweat from his temple. He looked around and blinked in surprise. Somehow, incredibly, his run had brought him directly to the front gate of the headman's manor. He breathed in deeply, sifting out his friends' scents from the smells of smoke and sweat and hay. Something inside him seemed to uncoil and relax, yet at the same time he felt strangely jumpy. Quietly, he leaped over the wall wrapping around the house and landed in a crouch next to the small pond in the headman's gardens.

"But what the hell can I do?" he whispered as he straightened, suddenly feeling weak and hating himself for it.

He could hear the breathing of every person in the house now. Everyone was peacefully asleep. Everyone but one person, whose breathing was quiet but irregular and shallow. Inuyasha had a pretty good feeling that he knew the identity of that one person, laying awake through the silent night, alone with only her own thoughts for company.

_Whatever I do, I end up hurting _someone, he thought in frustration, stepping onto the porch and sliding open the paper door. He heard Kagome's breath catch with surprise, then settle into a falsely even rhythm that didn't fool him and that she _knew_ wouldn't fool him. But he didn't acknowledge it. He never confronted her about staying up for him and didn't ever plan on doing so, because that choice would lead to decisions he doubted he'd _ever_ be prepared to make. She knew that, too.

He walked silently to the room the headman had given their small traveling band, locating a corner to occupy for the remainder of the night. A screen had been set up in the middle of the room, behind which Sango and Shippou slept while Kagome tried desperately to feign unconsciousness. Miroku, slouched over in sleep in the opposite corner, snorted awake and opened one eye. The monk's clear violet eye studied him in that vaguely disapproving way that Miroku could call up when he was upset but didn't want to cause a fuss. Then, the eye closed again, and he fell back asleep.

Inuyasha was torn between resentment toward the monk and gratitude that the man was still alert enough to notice intruders in the night. He settled for baring his teeth at Miroku's dimly lit form before settling himself into his corner. _That's the problem with people_, he decided as he hugged the Tessaiga to his chest. _They always expect you to do the "right" thing. Well, how the fuck are you supposed to the "right" thing when all of your options are _wrong?

-- -- --

"We are about to die," Saki whispered, her hand clenching nervously in her husband's sleeve. He could feel her shaking as she scooted into a corner of the room and dragged him along with her. "Husband, we are about to die."

Chitose was about to agree with her when his pride as village headman reasserted itself. Instead, he scoffed and shook off her trembling hand. "Do not say such foolish things, wife," he told her airily, coming to his feet and nodding at the paper screen door. "You must not allow yourself to be frightened into senselessness by some mere, strange noises—"

"Strange things have been happening ever since _they_ arrived," she hissed at him, still scooting toward the corner of the room furthest from the door. "Hanako-dono's odd behavior, those strange lights that appeared last evening, that noise of running feet that the villagers heard late, late in the night—"

"Do not be so narrow-minded as to blame newcomers for these strange events," he said firmly, hoping his words did not convey his own lack of faith in their visitors. "It is hardly fair to attribute to them what may be sheer coincidence."

Saki glared at him, about to make a retort. In that instant, the couple suddenly heard an enraged, incoherent roar that sounded something like, "_Oooooooo-iiiiii-aaaaAAAAAAA!_" Instead of replying, she shrieked and covered her head, collapsing into a quivering heap on the floor. "Husband, husband, do you not see, we are about to be destroyed by that group of savage killers that _you_ invited into our home!"

Chitose had already begun to say, "Shame on you for speaking so rudely of our honored guests," when he heard an unmistakably furious and somehow feminine voice shriek, "_You are DEAD, do you understand me? DEAD!_" The words froze on his tongue and his face turned slowly toward the door. When the loud crashing sound of a heavy object shattering what sounded oddly like a screen door (and part of the wall as well) reverberated through the air, he squeaked involuntarily and dropped to the floor.

"I think we truly are about to die, wife," he whispered, squeezing his eyes shut and quaking like a child.

-- -- --

"My deepest, humblest, most heartfelt apologies," Sango apologized, half-shouting to cover her embarrassment as she bowed to the frazzled-looking headman. Hiraikotsu lay on the ground several feet away, next to an unconscious Miroku. Behind her, the remains of the screen door (and part of the wall as well) lay scattered over the once orderly garden.

"I am so sorry," she told the grass at her feet, too embarrassed to look their host in the eye. "I foolishly lost control of my temper, and I damaged your home in my thoughtlessness!"

The headman sounded oddly relieved as he reassured her, "All is forgiven, honored traveler. There is always a slight risk in offering your home to strangers, and you are clearly remorseful. Let us not allow this matter to sour our goodwill."

Sango slowly straightened out of her bow, still unable to make herself look the headman in the eye. "Yes…thank you for your graciousness." _Stupid houshi-sama_, she thought vindictively, furtively casting a glance in his prone body's direction. _To think that he had the _nerve_ to wake me up by taking me by the—_

Her arms involuntarily rose to cross protectively over her chest. The warmth in her cheeks resurged. "We will repair the damage we've caused, however long it takes," she assured the headman, mentally vowing to make sure that the perverted monk got all the heavy work. Maybe if she tired him out enough he wouldn't have the energy to harass her for the rest of the day.

"No, no, absolutely not!" This time, the headman's voice was strangely anxious. "I…I cannot allow my guests to take on the work of servants! Leave it to me to fix this. You may continue on your journey free of guilt! I will even ask my servants to help you prepare!"

Sango raised her head, her shame fading in the face of suspicious curiosity. Was he perhaps…a bit _too_ eager?

He smiled brightly at her, his hands fidgeting nervously with the fabric of his sleeves. "Are there any supplies you require? Would you like me to recommend you a comfortable inn to stay in this evening? Would you like me to provide you with food of any sort?" He stopped for a moment and blinked. His face paled. "I meant, of course, would you like some of our crops or perhaps a bit of our animals' meat? Would that be all right? How about we give you a brace of chickens? Two? Three?"

Sango held out her hands to stop him. "We…it would be nice to have a basket or two of some vegetables, I suppose. And we would be quite grateful if you could spare a bit of meat. Enough for an evening meal."

"Of course!" He gave a quick, too-deep bow, and scrambled away, calling out orders. "Saki! Wife, have the servants prepare our honored guests enough food to feed a demon lord"—he cast a nervous glance over his shoulder and quickly corrected himself—"to feed an emperor and all of his court!"

The demon slayer watched him leave, still frantically calling upon his servants to make preparations that she certainly hadn't asked him to make. She sighed. "What a mess." She bent down and picked up a small pebble from the grass. Standing up again, she tossed it up and down a few times before winding up and throwing. It hit Miroku precisely in the middle of his forehead, leaving a small red mark. "I know you're awake, houshi-sama," she called to him when he didn't flinch. "Get your perverted self off the ground and wait for the headman to bring our food. Do _not_ con him out of anything else, make _sure_ you pay him, and don't even _think_ of coming close enough to me that I will be able to touch you with Hiraikotsu."

Having given him his orders, Sango marched away, picking up Hiraikotsu as she went, and walked back into the now door-less and partially wall-less room. Kagome and Shippou, eating their breakfast on one side of the room, looked up as she walked in. Inuyasha, sitting sullenly in a corner, flicked his ears in her direction. "That was humiliating," she told Kagome, walking over to the younger girl and sinking to the floor next to her. "To think that I damaged the home of a person kind enough to offer us shelter for the night—"

"Blame Miroku," Shippou said flatly, shoving a large chunk of rice in his mouth. Little white chunks spewed out of his mouth as he attempted to continue, "He's the pervert who got you into that mess."

"Shippou-chan, speaking with your mouth full is bad manners," Kagome said automatically, poking listlessly at her own bowl of rice.

Sango's mouth twisted angrily. Predictably, Inuyasha had taken off the moment Kikyou's soul stealer appeared last night. And he hadn't come back until long after she had fallen asleep. Judging by the shadows under Kagome's eyes, the girl had been laying awake all night, waiting for his return.

_This isn't fair!_ she fumed, pushing Hiraikotsu away from her and picking up a bowl for herself. _How can Inuyasha treat her like this? Why does she take it without fighting?_

But in the back of her stubborn, at the moment anti-male mind, she knew it wasn't that simple. Inuyasha was having trouble leaving Kikyou, which was hurting Kagome, but who was Sango to say that he should stay with Kagome and hurt Kikyou instead?

'_What a mess,' indeed,_ she thought. _Life seems so much simpler when you're battling just to _keep_ yours. I would almost welcome a demon attack at this point._

She announced into the tense silence, "The headman has made it clear, albeit very politely, that he wishes for us to leave as soon as possible. He is preparing for us 'enough food for a demon lord' and anything else that he believes will save his village from our bloodlust or whatever it may be. When he offered me 'food of any sort,' he obviously thought that we were about to demand the flesh of their seven most beautiful children. Or something similarly monstrous."

Shippou let out a short chuckle, and Kagome puffed out a small burst of air that could almost pass for a weak laugh. Inuyasha snorted and remarked to the hilt of his sword, "So much for good will."

"He wants to protect his village and himself. It's only natural in times like this," she replied to her rice bowl, refusing to look him in the eye. There was a good chance that, if she did, Inuyasha would end up with a few painful bruises in some sensitive places.

"And it proves most useful as well."

Sango stiffened as Miroku's voice floated through the massive gap in the wall Hiraikotsu had created. She still kept her eyes on her food. "What did he give us?"

"Five chickens, three baskets of vegetables, two coils of strong rope, a basket full of fine cloth and sewing material, a basket of travel clothing, a jar of burn salve—"

"By the gods!" Sango exclaimed, nearly dropping her rice bowl. "That is far too much! How could you possibly accept so much, houshi-sama? We must return at least half! Honestly, you'd think—"

She finally actually looked at Miroku and almost choked when she tried to stifle a laugh. The monk had an amusingly childish pout on his face. "This staff has been blessed with enough spells to slay low-rank demons with a mere touch," he said mournfully. "I polish it regularly and have treasured it for years. Now look at it."

Miroku's precious monk staff, a pole with one end shod in bronze and a jingling bronze ornament on the other end, was slung over his shoulders, bending slightly under the weight of six filled straw baskets and five dead chickens, strung to each other by the neck. The monk looked so heartbroken by the degradation of his precious possession that Sango could already feel her anger toward him softening.

_No! Sango, you go too easy on him! It's because you fall for his little charms that he gets away with so much!_ She cleared her throat and said bluntly, "You deserve it. Anyways, houshi-sama, we really must return some of that. We don't need it all, and every little bit counts when a small village like this is storing supplies for the winter."

"I am well aware of that, Sango," he said, his voice even and reasonable now that Sango had made it clear that she would waste no pity on him. Even the "poor me" expression in his eyes had been replaced by a matter-of-fact resignation. "However, the headman became even more agitated when I told him that I couldn't accept it all. The poor man began babbling about sacrificing a whole cow to us—"

"His kind make me sick," Inuyasha interrupted, not making eye contact with anyone in particular. "They're so desperate to save their own skins from us 'bloodthirsty demons' or whatever they think we are that they'll do anything. Push a little harder and they'd probably offer a tender young maiden to us next."

Sango turned to Miroku just in time to see a hopeful sparkle in his amethyst eyes. "No," she said flatly, cutting him off before his mouth even opened. "Houshi-sama, are you _sure_ you cannot return these supplies to him?"

He nodded and sighed. "I am afraid if we do, the whole village will likely spend years in terror, waiting for us to fall upon them in revenge for providing inadequate hospitality. Or something like that," he added tiredly.

"Well, what the hell do you expect to do with all that crap, then?" Inuyasha snapped, jerking his chin at the many supplies Miroku carried. "It's a fucking waste to just toss them the minute we start thinking they're too heavy."

Miroku casually suggested, "Perhaps we could take them to Kaede-sama."

The atmosphere in the hut instantly tensed. Kaede, Kikyou's younger sister but now elderly due to the fifty years between Kikyou's death and resurrection, lived in the village next to the well that led back to Kagome's time. As innocent as Miroku's suggestion seemed, they all knew that he was subtly proposing that Kagome should go home for a time.

Sango's eyes went to Kagome first. The young woman didn't look up; she kept poking at her rice as if she hadn't been listening to the conversation at all. But the tense set of her shoulders was enough to tell Sango that she had heard, at the very least, Miroku's words.

Next, she looked to Inuyasha. He was scowling openly at Miroku, who merely raised his eyebrows at the half-demon. Sango knew that look in his eyes. It was a look he used when he was upset but for some reason unable or unwilling to say so. She knew that this time, he couldn't say he was upset because it would be embarrassing for Kagome. But even though the monk remained silent, she knew that he was as angry with Inuyasha as she was.

"I think that's a good idea," she said softly. Inuyasha's head whipped toward her at those words, his golden eyes burning with resentment. Then, the half-demon looked at Shippou and Kagome. Kagome didn't seem to notice, but Shippou stared solidly back at Inuyasha.

Finally, Inuyasha snorted and stood, sliding Tessaiga back into his belt. "Since no one seems to have any better ideas."

"Why don't _you_ think of one?" Shippou asked defiantly. He quieted, however, when Kagome gently laid her hand on his head. Apparently, Kagome didn't want things to escalate into a fight.

"I guess it's settled then," Miroku said into the silence, setting his burden on the ground. "However, I am afraid that I will not be able to carry all of these gifts all the way back to Edo myself. Inuyasha, if you would be so kind? And Kirara, may I ask your assistance as well?"

Without being asked, Kagome stood and walked to the yellow backpack she always brought with her to the Feudal Era. She drew out a ball of string—or "twine" as she called it—and a pair of knives she called "scissors." Sango took them from her friend's hands; but when she tried to give Kagome an encouraging smile, the girl merely looked away and began to clean up the room. With a sigh, Sango took two baskets and tied them together by the handles, then did the same for two more. These would be slung over Kirara's back once the cat demon transformed into her large form. She herself took the dead chickens, leaving Miroku and Inuyasha to take the last two baskets.

Moving in this same uncomfortable silence, the five of them—six, including Kirara—prepared for the journey back home. Miroku cheerily thanked the headman for his hospitality, but the traveling companions did not trade any words with each other. Too much had happened the day before.

_Maybe it's a good thing that Kagome-chan is going home for a few days, for all of us_, Sango reflected. _A break might remind us how we ever kept ourselves from killing each other this past year._

_We seem to be needing breaks like that more and more often these days._

-- -- --

**Modern Era, Late May**

"Life officially sucks," Kagome grumbled, turning on her mother's laptop. "And that, ladies and gentlemen, is the understatement of a lifetime."

Kagome had returned to her own time in the late afternoon the day before. She had been immensely relieved to see the well after the most awkwardly silent journey she and her friends had ever shared. Needless to say, she had ridden Kirara, while Inuyasha ended up carrying three baskets of excess supplies instead of one. But there had been no conversation whatsoever. Inuyasha had announced a brief stop for everyone to relieve themselves. Kagome had apologized to Sango for accidentally elbowing her while shifting on Kirara's back. She had halfheartedly returned Shippou's soft goodbye. Otherwise, no words at all.

_And I was depressed and pissed on top of all that_, she reflected. _Pissed at Inuyasha for leaving, pissed at the others for letting him leave, pissed at Kikyou for…well, for existing, really, and pissed at _myself_ for getting pissed at them all._ Kagome sighed heavily. _After all, it's no one's fault that Inuyasha is still in love._

"Damn it," she whispered, feeling her heart twinge at the thought. "I didn't want to think about this yet."

She swallowed heavily, forcing back a heavy wave of self-pity, and focused on the laptop. "You have a project to finish," she firmly instructed herself. "Worry about your family tree now, and _then_ you can worry about messy relationships. This break will do you good!"

And so Kagome continued her research, somewhat encouraged by the fact that she would not need to deal with her and Inuyasha's problems just yet.

Little did she know that this break would cause far more problems than it would help her solve.

-- -- --

**Feudal Era, Early June**

Shippou, being a fox demon and thus devious at heart, loved stirring up little conflicts. But he was also clever and generally knew when it would be a good idea to lie low and let the storm blow over.

And he knew that, right now, lying low was a _very_ good idea.

"It's been _five_ days!" Inuyasha snarled into Miroku's face, his hands twitching with the effort of suppressing some very violent gesture. The monk was standing stubbornly in the doorway of Kaede's hut, refusing to let Inuyasha leave. "I don't care _what_ you accuse me of doing to Kagome; five days is _way_ too long! No matter what her pathetic little heart is crying about, it doesn't change the fact that Naraku is _somewhere_ out there, using Shikon shards and his dirty tactics to recover from his injuries! We need to find him _now_, and Kagome can track his shards!"

Miroku looked calmly back at Inuyasha, who was currently seconds away from pummeling him into complete senselessness. "I am perfectly aware that Naraku needs to be found. Kagome also knows this. She will come back; but she will hardly be of any use if she is still too hurt to even speak to us. Give her time."

"Fuck that!" the half-demon spat. "We need her here, _now!_"

Shippou watched silently from the corner as Inuyasha lifted Miroku up by the front of his robes, shoved him away from the doorway, and streaked off toward the well, all at a speed that even Shippou's demon vision could just barely track. Sango had half-risen to her feet, but in less than an eyeblink, Inuyasha was gone.

Miroku dusted off his robes where he had smacked into the wall and sighed. "I tried."

"Normally I'd blame you for not putting up more of a fight, but then how is it possible to resist an attack you can't see?" Sango sat heavily back down before the fire pit. "Do you think Kagome-chan is ready to see him?"

Miroku ran his fingers through his long bangs, setting them back in order, before seating himself on the opposite side of the fire. "Whether she is ready or not, the two of them will work something out. Either she'll force him back here, or they'll scream themselves hoarse at each other and then make up. Preferably with a kiss, but considering Inuyasha's circumstances and his weak powers of observation, that is highly unlikely."

Sango grinned weakly at the gentle insult. "You're right." She silently contemplated the flames for a few moments before murmuring, "But really, houshi-sama, I don't know how much longer any of us will be able to take this. The three of us sitting here, brewing at Inuyasha for being a complete fool. Inuyasha running back and forth between Kikyou and Kagome-chan. And poor Kagome-chan getting her heart broken and mended over and over again by that idiot. Don't you think something will eventually…break?"

Shippou stiffened in his corner. "Break"…did that mean what he thought meant?

The monk frowned into the fire and answered, "I am afraid…every living creature has its limits. Even a person as kind and forgiving as Kagome-sama may—"

"What do you know, Miroku?" Shippou interrupted, leaping to his feet. "What do you know about what _might_ happen in the future?"

The two adults looked at him in surprise, as if they had forgotten he was there. "What do you mean, Shippou-chan?" Sango asked softly, exchanging a quick glance with Miroku.

"_No one_ knows what will happen in the future! We only know that in the past, Kagome _always_ forgave Inuyasha, no matter what! Why would she stop now?" he pressed, glaring into Miroku's clear violet eyes. He could feel his hands shaking with anger. Why _should_ it stop now? Life had always gone this way before: Inuyasha acted like an idiot, then he felt bad, and Kagome forgave him! Sure, one day Inuyasha would realize that it was Kagome he should be chasing, not Kikyou…but besides that, life would always be the same!

He could tell that Miroku was choosing his words carefully as he answered, "Shippou, I know you have gone through ordeals that have aged you beyond your years. But there are still many things…" He looked at Sango again.

"…there are still many things that are beyond your comprehension," he continued softly. "Just because things have always been one way does not mean they will remain so in the future. Just because a person loves another does not mean that that person does not have limits that should not be crossed. Inuyasha and Kagome are walking an increasingly treacherous path, and I fear that soon, we will be facing some tremendous change in our lives. We can only pray that it will be a change for the better."

Biting his lip, the fox demon looked away. Miroku could be an idiot, but when he became serious, he was the smartest person Shippou knew. Since the fox demon didn't think he had ever seen the monk so serious before, that _must_ mean that Sango was right…but no, she _couldn't_ be right! She just _couldn't_ be!

The gods only knew what would have popped out of his mouth next if a shadow had not suddenly blocked the light coming through the doorway. The three of them all looked up at once, instincts tingling.

Inuyasha had returned and was looming just inside the door, giving them all the most complicated glare Shippou had ever seen his life. He looked around the hut once and then let his piercing golden eyes settle on Miroku. "Monk, you come with me."

"Why?" Miroku asked automatically, even as he began to get to his feet.

"_Don't argue!_" Inuyasha snapped, turning sharply on his heel and marching toward the well. "You're coming with me _now!_"

"I'm coming, I'm coming, but _why_? How come you returned so quickly?" Miroku pressed, grabbing his monk staff and hurrying out of the hut.

"I need you to break a barrier," the half-demon curtly answered. "A barrier of spiritual power that my Tessaiga can't do a damn thing about."

"What kind of barrier?" Sango asked, rising to her feet as well. "What is it blocking?"

"Time," he said shortly, striding away with wide, quick-paced steps that had Miroku jogging to keep up. He moved out of sight so quickly that Shippou wondered if Sango even heard him continue, "Kagome's sealed the well."

_(end)_

-- -- --

_Finally, the real plot begins to reveal itself! Again, I'm sorry it took so long, but at least it's finally done!_

_…yeah. It's been too long, so I don't remember what I used to ramble about in this section. So I'll shut up. Hope you enjoyed the chapter!_


	4. Wrong

**Blood Ties, Blood Lies**

**Chapter Four: Wrong**

_I am _so _sorry for taking so long to finish this chapter! But finally, here it is!_

_Quick note: "Nee-san" is one way to address an older sister. Isn't that how Souta refers to Kagome? Also, "kaa-san" is kind of an offhand way to refer to one's mother._

_Japanese Word of the Day:_ Chigau– _different._

-- -- --

**Feudal Era, Early June**

Miroku leaned tiredly against the wall, listlessly observing as Sango tossed herbs into a pot of what would soon be dinner. As he watched her, she looked at him and gave him a forced smile. "Are you feeling better, houshi-sama?"

He grimaced back at her. "Well, it's certainly an improvement to be able to feel my fingers again."

"I see…" She gave the pot a stir, then thoughtfully set down the ladle. "This doesn't feel real."

"What do you mean?" he asked her, sitting up a little straighter. He winced as the movement sent a small wave of dizziness washing over him.

"It doesn't feel real that…Kagome-chan is gone." She met his eyes. "Don't you feel as if she'll suddenly enter the hut, arguing with Inuyasha about how much time she spent in her own time? Doesn't it still seem like life will carry on the way it always has?"

Miroku went silent for a long time. It had been three days since Inuyasha had commanded him to come to the well and break whatever spell was sealing it. It had been three days since Miroku had thrown every trick he knew at the ordinary-looking pile of old wood and found his efforts futile. It had been three days since he had finally collapsed, drained of power, out of energy, and filled with a curiously empty loneliness.

Sango and Kirara had helped him back to Kaede's hut. But Inuyasha and Shippou didn't move a step away from the well. They stayed there the entire night, doing only the gods knew what. Arguing, brainstorming, or maybe just staring. Waiting for Kagome to suddenly appear and tell them it had been a joke. Shippou eventually came back, but Miroku, confined to his bed, hadn't seen Inuyasha since then. It saddened him a bit to think that the half-demon was so desperate to believe that Kagome would really come back.

But at the same time, he knew that both he and Sango were secretly hoping for the same thing. Hoping that Kagome would return. Hoping that out of blue she would appear out of nowhere and laugh, saying she had chosen to stay with them after all. It was foolish, but what else did they have to hold on to?

For that reason, he chose his words carefully when he answered Sango. Not only for her sake, but also for his own. "Life will certainly carry on, with or without Kagome-sama's presence. But I doubt it will carry on the way it has. You and I both know what a great change this makes in our lives. Even if she suddenly lifts the seal on the well and returns, there is now a huge wound between her and Inuyasha that I doubt the two of them will ever be able to forget." He raised an eyebrow at her. "You yourself said that eventually something would break."

She flushed and said hurriedly, "I never implied that I _wanted_ such a thing to happen—"

"And I never said that you did," he finished for her. "What I am saying is that we all knew that eventually, Kagome-sama and Inuyasha would either reconcile that mess between them and Kikyou-sama, or else simply snap. It was merely a matter of seeing which would happen first. It seems that Kagome-sama has finally decided that enough is enough."

Sango's forehead wrinkled, and she protested, "But that doesn't feel right. I can't see why Kagome-chan would choose to do something so drastic. It's not just Inuyasha who needs her. _We_ need her, too."

He sighed. "Perhaps it was simply too much for her. Kagome-sama is a naturally caring person; trust and love come to her quickly and they both run very deep. Inuyasha's actions have deeply wounded her _because_ of her tendency to trust so deeply. She feels the damage twice as much as either of us would, I'm sure."

Silence fell between them, broken only by the crackling flames and the hiss as the pot over the fires came to a boil. Using large, wet rags, Sango removed the pot and set it to the side. "…should we call for the others?"

"I know Inuyasha won't come," Miroku said in a resigned tone. "But we should tell Shippou."

Sango stared blankly at the pot before shaking her head. "But Inuyasha needs to eat. How about I send Kirara with some of this? That way, Shippou-chan can eat, and Inuyasha…_might_."

Miroku smiled grimly. Three days ago, life had seemed to be passing normally. Sure, Kagome had been taking longer than usual to come back, but it was hardly a surprise, considering all that she had gone through. But when Inuyasha had come with the news that he couldn't pass the well, Miroku had felt a chill pass over him. Even as Inuyasha all but dragged him to the well, he couldn't stop the feeling that maybe…maybe it was _time_…

Of course he knew it was wrong to think in such a way. But at the same time, that may have been the "break" that he, Sango, and Shippou had discussed only moments before. Not just a few days' rest from each others' company…but a true, final parting. Maybe things had been meant to end here.

Of course, he didn't dare voice such a thought. Saying such an ugly thing would only make it real, and he was sure that Inuyasha would not appreciate that. Sango had probably thought the same thing. And little Shippou. What of him? Who knew what he was thinking right now? He could still naively believe that Kagome would return—which Miroku desperately wished to believe himself. But perhaps, thanks to that strange, intuitive wisdom children possess, he also thought that perhaps this time, Kagome's return to her world would be permanent.

"Yes, perhaps we should send them something to eat," he agreed, letting his eyes close. "As Inuyasha no longer seems to care for his own well-being, it is up to us to care in his place."

He knew that Sango longed to say something in response to that. That it felt like they were the ones paying the consequences for Kagome's choice. That under normal circumstances, Kagome would have been the one to care about Inuyasha's health.

But then again, under normal circumstances, this problem would not have existed in the first place.

Instead of replying, Sango murmured instructions to Kirara, spooning some of the stew into a container of some sort. Miroku heard a lid close, then heard the container rattling as Sango took it outside and set it on the ground. There was a roaring sound as Kirara transformed into her larger form, a clatter as she picked up the container, then a loud _whoosh_ as she took to the air.

Back inside the hut, Sango's footsteps whispered across the dirt floor before coming to a stop right in front of him. "Houshi-sama, perhaps before you worry about Inuyasha's well-being, you should worry about your own. I will _not_ allow you to sleep through a meal again. Your power was drained, and you need proper care in order to regain it!"

Miroku reluctantly opened his eyes and found the demon slayer standing before him with a steaming bowl in her hand. "Sango…"

"Not a word!" she said bossily, kneeling down next to him. "You will eat this and _finish_ it, even if I need to force-feed every last bite down your throat!"

Yet despite her hard words, her hands were gentle as she pressed the bowl against Miroku's lips. Even the slightest movement still made the monk dizzy, so he had no choice but to allow himself to be fed like this. He drank slowly, taking care not to burn his mouth on the hot food. He could feel Sango's eyes on his face, watching him for a sign that he needed water or that he needed to catch his breath.

But what he really noticed was the way Sango's hands shook slightly as she tipped the bowl's contents into his mouth. _She's scared_, he realized, letting his eyes flicker in her direction for the briefest moment. _Kagome-sama is perhaps the most important person in her life right now. She is important to us all. How will we move forward without her?_

Neither of them said a word to each other. Their minds were filled with questions and doubts, and the crackling fire was curiously loud as the sun grew dark and Kirara returned with an untouched pot of stew.

-- -- --

**Modern Era, Early June**

Sakuno Higurashi-san had been about to leave for work, hastily straightening her clothes and grabbing the car keys from the kitchen table, muttering to herself about alarm clocks that refused to do their jobs properly, when the phone rang. She glanced at it over her shoulder as it rang once…twice…

_That's right, Souta isn't home and Kagome won't answer it…_

With a sigh, she set down her purse and rushed to the phone. She picked up and answered, "Hello, you have reached the Higurashi residence. This is Sakuno Higurashi speaking; how may I help you?"

"Hello, Higurashi-san? This is Eri. May I please speak to Kagome-chan?"

"You…want to speak to Kagome?" Higurashi-san glanced up at the ceiling in the direction of her daughter's room, as if checking to see if she were there. "I'm afraid she isn't available right now. Would you like to leave a message for her?"

"Kagome-chan _still_ isn't around? Is she in the hospital again? Is she all right?"

"No, no, she's out of the hospital. It's just that she's…occupied already."

"I see. Well then, I would appreciate it if you could ask her to call me back whenever she can. We girls want to hang out with her some time."

"Of course, Eri-chan," Higurashi-san said warmly. "She will call you as soon as she's free."

"Thank you, Higurashi-san," Eri replied. "Goodbye."

"Goodbye." She returned the phone to its cradle with a sigh and picked up a memo pad and pen. _Kagome_, she wrote with a slight frown on her face. _Eri-chan called this morning. She would like you to call her back whenever you can. Please do call. Kaa-san._

She set the note down in the middle of the table and stared at it for a moment. Her daughter had come home eight days ago very quiet and rather blue. Of course Higurashi-san knew that it had something to do with Inuyasha-kun. Only he could affect her naturally chipper daughter that way. And in the end, only he could cheer her up. So she did all she could as a mother, smiling, cooking her favorite foods, letting Kagome know that she was there while still giving her space if she wanted it. It was difficult, but in the end it was the only effective way to help her daughter.

But when Kagome had abruptly asked Higurashi-san's father to seal the well on her third day home, she suddenly doubted whether this "only effective way" of hers was really the best she could do. Kagome's fourth day home was the day the school year ended for her, so since then Kagome had been hanging around the house and having very strange mood swings. Sometimes she was so depressed that she would lock herself in her room, skipping meals, sleeping during the day, and wandering aimlessly up and down the upstairs hallway at night. Sometimes she became strangely energetic, taking over the kitchen with enormous cooking projects or cleaning up dusty old shrines that hadn't seen the light in years.

Frankly, the change frightened her, and Higurashi-san was growing more and more desperate to find some way to help her daughter. For the past year she had made it a rule not to ask about the goings-on beyond the well. The occasional bloodstains on Kagome's clothes, the fierce arguments with Inuyasha, and the way Kagome stared at the half-demon boy when she thought no one was looking were already plenty. But at a time like this, when it seemed like her daughter was on the edge of a breakdown, she felt more and more that it was time to stop being the accepting friend and become the prying mother. Even if Kagome resented the change, something was seriously _wrong_ with her daughter.

She glanced down at her watch and muttered a curse under her breath. "I'm late."

Looking again in the direction of Kagome's room, its door probably locked as a result of one of Kagome's depressed spells, Higurashi-san rushed out of the house, half-wishing that Kagome was still at that age when anything could be cured with a Band-aid and a kiss.

-- -- --

**Feudal Era, Early June**

Shippou perched on the edge of the well. In its dark depths, Inuyasha's silver hair and crimson clothes flickered and flashed as the half-demon desperately dug into the dirt at the bottom. "Inuyasha,"—he ventured with a tremor in his voice—"aren't you tired?"

The fox demon wasn't sure what scared him most: the fact that for the past three days Inuyasha had spent his time either digging or staring listlessly into space, or that he hadn't made a single sound all this time. That day when the well had been sealed off, Miroku had gone at it for hours, doing everything from chanting to attacking it with his staff to throwing ofuda that made Shippou nauseous just _looking_ at them. Finally, long after the sky had gone dark, the monk lost the battle of endurance, and his legs suddenly refused to support him anymore.

And that was when they had finally accepted it: Kagome could not and would not return. And there was nothing any of them could do about it.

Only Inuyasha had refused to believe it. Since that tense, emotional day, Shippou remembered Inuyasha tightly pressing his lips together and leaping into the well. And since then, he hadn't slept or eaten a proper meal. Despite his body's naturally quick healing process, Shippou had noticed blisters on Inuyasha's knuckles the last time he had jumped out for a drink. There were shadows under his golden eyes, which were dulling by the day. And he never spoke.

There was something seriously wrong with him.

"Inuyasha," he called out again. "Don't…don't you think you need to take a break? Kirara brought food a while…ago…"

The half-demon stopped and looked up. Their eyes met, and suddenly it didn't matter that Inuyasha refused to speak. His words were clearly expressed through his eyes: "Are you a fool?"

And he went back to digging, silently flinging dirt out of the well in large clods. Old soil tangled with roots and streaked with clay already formed a sort of ring around the well, and the circle grew higher by the hour.

Shippou bit his lip. He wanted Kagome back, too. What was he without the angel who had pitied him, pampered him, protected him ever since his parents had been murdered? Inuyasha probably wanted her back even more than Shippou did. But no matter how much he wished for her to come back, this…this was just wrong.

-- -- --

**Modern Era, Early June**

"Nee-san?"

Kagome spun around, her eyes wide with surprise, the sticky ladle in her hand held up like a spear. "What? Who is it?"

Souta, Kagome's nine-year-old brother, rubbed sleepily at his eyes, leaning slightly against the wall. "Nee-san, it's three in the morning. What are you doing?"

She relaxed slightly, although there was a frenzied look in her eye that did not disappear. "Oh, it's you, Souta. Is it really that late? I totally didn't realize. You just get so caught up, you know." She spoke unusually quickly and randomly broke up her sentences with short, nervous bursts of laughter. "I'm making bentos, you see?"

_Oh no_, Souta thought, following her hand as she gestured at the kitchen counter. "…how many _are_ there?"

"Hm?" Kagome's hair had been tied back, and now she nervously twisted it into a bun and let it fall out again, over and over, unable to keep still. "How many? At last count, I think it was something like eleven—"

"_Eleven?_"

"Well, yeah, they tend to pile up the longer you go—"

"Don't tell me that you've been at this since dinner, nee-san?"

"Of course, how else would I have made so many?"

Souta nervously eyed the pile of neatly prepared boxes. "And who are they for?" he asked cautiously.

Kagome visibly twitched, then tittered in a high, fake voice and answered, "Well, I suppose you'll have one, and Mom and Jii-chan can have two, and my friends will appreciate it, I'm sure, plus maybe it'll save Mom some effort with tomorrow's dinner—well, tonight's dinner, technically, since it's already three o' clock—"

"_Why are you doing this, nee-san?_" Souta interrupted, now wide-awake and scared. "This is really, really weird. Yesterday you spent seven hours making shaved ice, and the day before that you cleaned the _whole_ shrine grounds, and before that it was omelettes. What are you _doing_?"

She beamed at him and turned back to her half-finished box. "Silly Souta, I'm keeping busy. What with summer break, I'm feeling a bit restless."

"Don't you have summer homework to do?" he asked helplessly.

Kagome jerked in surprise and dropped the ladle on the counter. Then, she turned and gave him a huge fake grin. "If it's all right with you, I'd really rather not think about schoolwork right now, thanks. Besides, aren't you glad that you have so much food?"

"Your cooking's gotten better, nee-san, but this is still weird," he said quietly, wondering why schoolwork had suddenly become such a sensitive topic. Had she failed her classes? That couldn't be right; school had let out four days ago, so surely her grades weren't ready yet. "You've been acting so strange since the last time you came back. And you've stayed so long! Won't Inuyasha get mad and come for you?"

This time, Kagome was apparently so shocked that her wild twitch sent three bento boxes flying, spilling their contents onto the kitchen floor. "Oops!" she said, laughing gaily. "Clumsy me! Souta, be a dear, won't you? Let's also not talk about Inuyasha for a while, okay?"

"Okay…do you want me to help you?" he asked her as she knelt down and began dropping chunks of food into the trash can.

"_No!_" she snapped at him, flinging a chunk of ham so violently into the can that he heard it splat again the bottom. Then she dropped the can and covered her mouth. "S-sorry," she said softly. "That came out wrong."

Souta took a careful step forward. "Nee-san, are you all right?"

Kagome stared back at him for a long moment before abruptly coming to her feet, the spilled bentos forgotten. "Well, would you look at the time," she chirped gaily, sailing back to the kitchen counter. "It's pretty late, Souta, you'd better get back to bed!"

"But you should sleep, too," he said anxiously, remaining in place.

"I _said_ you had better get back to bed!" Kagome replied in a singsong voice, washing off the ladle she had dropped. "Don't you worry about little ol' me! You just move along and let me run around a little bit more! You know how it gets: you get a little restless and start thinking too much so you really _badly_ need to just get moving and _do_ something, no matter how useless it may seem—"

-- -- --

And in two different worlds, separated by five hundred years of war, peace, and development, and connected by a simple dry well, two young boys entreated the people they most admired in the world:

-- -- --

"Inuyasha…"

-- -- --

"Nee-san, listen to me!"

-- -- --

"_You have to stop!_"

_(end)_

-- -- --

_Not my best...but the first draft was even worse, so I'll take comfort from that. We get to see Kikyou again next chapter, so stay tuned!_


	5. Aftermath

**Blood Ties, Blood Lies**

**Chapter Five: Aftermath**

_So it's been, like, a two year hiatus. I got out of the fanfiction cycle for a long time, obviously, but I think hearing about the release of The Final Act somehow really pumped up my love for Inuyasha again. And I miss writing. Anyways, I'm pretty sure all of my old readers are gone, so I hope all you new folks like what you see! But, if you are an old reader, you have my deepest, deepest gratitude for your loyalty and patience. Please enjoy!_

-- -- --

**Feudal Era, Late June**

As Miroku had said it would, life carried on. The monk regained his strength, Sango no longer talked about Kagome as if begging someone to confirm whether she was coming home to them or not, and Shippou learned to keep his counsel to himself.

Inuyasha tore himself away from the well only after he had spent four days digging and the next three keeping a noiseless vigil over it, never acknowledging the silently sympathetic villagers who came to re-fill the well as he brooded. Shippou got the feeling that Inuyasha regarded them with contempt. Why, after all, should they bother to restore it when it could never be used again? How sweet, how sentimental, also useless and stupid. How utterly fucking stupid.

But Shippou disagreed. Kagome had been a beacon of light for him, a protector, a mother, an angel. She would not leave him behind. She would not leave Inuyasha, who she secretly loved, or Miroku and Sango, who she treated like her own brother and sister. What was stupid was that they had suddenly lost faith in the one person who had always trusted all of _them_. That was what he thought. But then what did he know? Little Shippou-chan was just a child, hopeful, willful, naïve. He could see it in Miroku and Sango's sad eyes. "Let him believe in the impossible," they were thinking. "It is a hard world, and he must live with its harsh realities. Let him learn to see them. As we all learned."

No mistake, they were all older and had experienced a lot more than Shippou had, but he was not an innocent child himself. He had seen his share of blood even before losing his family to the Thunder Brothers. Kitsune kits were something of a "sport" prey for certain demons out there, and it was only Father's great cunning and Mother's steadiness that had saved him and his brothers and sisters so many times before Hiten and Manten came with their Jewel shards. And then his family had been slain. He had taken his revenge, with help, and he had joined this new family instead, which had more than its share of bloodiness and sad stories. Shippou knew something about the world. He had to have learned something, with his upbringing.

Yet the others did not see that. He had thought Kaede might understand, since she was far wiser than any of them, but she, too, had given up on Kagome. At least she was not like the monk and taijiya, who let him speak his mind but exchanged sad, knowing, and infuriatingly superior looks over his head. At least the old priestess acknowledged his words and explained to him time and time again why Kagome would probably not come back, so every time he could argue back.

Certain as he was that Kagome might return, he never voiced those opinions in front of Inuyasha. He was not sure of what Inuyasha thought, and he was almost scared to see how Inuyasha might react.

Of everyone else, the hanyou had obviously been hit the hardest. It had been three weeks since Kagome had gone. After finally giving up on the well, Inuyasha started wandering. He would disappear for hours, typically for at least a day, and none of them knew what he was up to, because no one could muster up the courage or the cold candor needed to convince him to stay here with the empty hole Kagome had left.

Once, a few village men had stumbled upon him perched in the trees not far from the Goshinboku, but he didn't go there every time he disappeared. No one knew where he went instead. He never told anyone when or where he was going, what he did, or when he would come back. The first time he disappeared, he came back after three whole days. Sometimes, Shippou wondered if it was only the fleeting hope that Kagome had returned in his absence that had made Inuyasha come home at all.

At least he had started talking and mingling with people again, in those brief times between his "outings." He asked for news, threw half-hearted insults at Shippou that were half-heartedly returned, and sometimes sat with Miroku late into the night, staring at the fire, neither saying much beyond comments on the weather.

Miroku himself was having problems. Kagome had always been the peacekeeper. It was she who cooled Sango's anger at the perverted monk, kept Shippou well-behaved, and of course disciplined Inuyasha. But now she was gone, and with added stress the tension doubled. Miroku had not pulled anything too improper for a long time, but Sango was tense and had a tendency to snap at others. Kaede was of course getting older, needing more help than before and suddenly having more bones to pick with the young people sharing her home. Inuyasha was just impossible, and Shippou was aware—and somewhat sorry—that he himself was misbehaving and wandering off more.

Miroku tried to take on the role of peacekeeper and did a fairly good job, but it was a thankless one. Everyone was short with him at some point, and the kitsune wondered if maybe he felt too "relied upon." Shippou could see the stress building in him, gathering in tiny wrinkles and shadows under his eyes that had not been there before.

Kagome had been some sort of neutral ground where all of them could meet, and family or not, she had made everything so much easier. Now, without her, there was a sense of disconnection, a need for someone to mediate, someone to talk to everyone and decide if something had to be dealt with. Miroku had stepped into shoes that simply were not made for his feet. He was a monk and could be an attentive listener, but he did not have the heart needed for this job. It was Kagome's job, and Kagome alone could do it. Without her, Miroku would eventually break, and the family _really_ would be destroyed. It was only in the dark, lonely nights when Shippou woke up from strange dreams when he dared to think _that_ was the reason he still believed that Kagome would come home. Because if she did not, his family would be gone.

Again.

-- -- --

Sometimes she wondered if he was actually one of the cold, distant stars come to walk among the dull creatures of this dark, dirty earth. Even when covered in blood, wounded, angry, he shone steadily with that cool, never-changing elegance that had snared in her in a heartbeat. It was not that she was in love with him. She was far too young, he far too old and different, and he wasn't the sort to love romantically anyways. He was someone to serve, to respect, to worship from afar.

_A god_, Rin thought idly, as she plucked a blade of grass from the ground. She examined the dew drops that slowly ran off its tip, then flicked it out of her fingers again. The sun had only just risen, but she had woken early, and now she was bored. Jaken, the fussy green imp, was still sleeping soundly against Ah-Un's flank, and she felt no temptation to wake him up. Already meticulous and grating during the day, Jaken was even worse when woken early in the morning. So she left him alone.

The three of them had spent the night in a small clearing, the remains of last night's fire still smoking slightly from a blackened heap of ashes and charred wood. Rin ambled over and picked up a stick from the ground, poking into the fire to expose any still-hot embers. When all had cooled and gone dark amongst the cool grass and dew, the fire too lost its appeal, and she turned. Her footprints were dark against the glittering ground, and she scowled. When Sesshoumaru-sama walked, he never seemed to leave footprints. She wondered if the grass even bent beneath his feet. Was he some kind of spirit, so light he could walk on air?

But that was silliness. Rin was ten, still young enough to occasionally entertain thoughts of the impossible, but her hard life had taught her to be a realist. Sesshoumaru-sama was a demon, capable of getting wounded, of falling, of being beaten. He was not immortal, although he was certainly close enough to it. She had seen that for herself the day she met him. She had come upon him in the woods, while running from the villagers determined to beat her for stealing their food, never mind that she wanted to survive as much as they did. What had first hit her was the stench of blood. He was covered in it; his clothes, his skin, his fine silver hair, all were smeared with a combination of fresh crimson blood and its dried, rust-colored form. His eyes were wild, gold and red like the sunset over a ferocious battle, and his fangs and vibrant stripes made him look like a wild beast.

But she knew he was not. In those eyes she saw pain and anger, but she also saw a brief flash of curiosity, and the glow of calculation. He didn't look at home sprawled on the dark forest floor. Even in his haggard state, he looked like he belonged on a throne, sitting amongst the gods and spirits.

Rin had been curious. He snarled viciously at her and she was afraid, but at the same time she wanted to go closer to him, to search out more of the beauty that shone from beneath his torn clothes and bloodstains. And so time and time again, she would return to that same place, sometimes with food offerings, which he always refused. Sometimes she wondered if he planned to eat _her_ once he could move without pain, and was simply saving stomach room.

But she couldn't help herself. Rin had kept visiting him, sometimes simply squatting at the edge of the clearing and staring at him. Back then, she still could not speak. Memories of blood and bandits and shining swords choked off all of her words when she tried, but the stranger did not seem to mind. He rarely spoke to her anyways. Most days he barely glanced at her before closing his eyes and leaning back against a tree. She knew he didn't sleep; he was far too alert for that, but still the silences between them were oddly comfortable. It didn't matter that they barely communicated. Rin could spend hours contemplating this beautiful creature, making up wondrous stories of his past, his world, his destiny. She knew he would eventually heal and leave, which saddened her, but it never crossed her mind that he would bring her along.

Ah-Un's waking grunts shook Rin free of her vivid memories. Those few days had been somehow peaceful and happy, but most of her life before her rebirth was lonely, sad, and cold. It was only Sessoumaru-sama's unexplainable whims that had brought her to what seemed like a whole new world, where she could be a child: well provided for, carefree, not beaten and scorned like a thieving dog. Memories of her past only darkened the cheer and optimism she had developed since she was brought back to life, and she was glad to forget them as much as possible.

"Ah-Un-chan, good morning," she said softly, rising and walking toward the two-headed demon. "You are certainly up early, aren't you?"

When she reached up to stroke the normally placid demon, it snorted and tossed its heads. With a moaning grunt, it heaved itself off the ground, sending Jaken spilling to the ground once his backrest was gone. He woke sputtering, "Who's there? What do you want? Who disturbs Jaken!"

Rin couldn't help but laugh. Jaken was very pretentious, although he did his best to curb it when Sesshoumaru-sama was around. She never did understand how someone as proud as Jaken could stand to follow someone else so devotedly. Maybe Sesshoumaru-sama was just that impressive. She could believe that.

"Good morning, Jaken-sama," she said angelically, laughing again when the still-groggy imp spun in her direction. "How did you sleep?"

"Badly, Rin," he said, brushing dead grass off his shapeless brown robe. Seemingly in hindsight, he stiffly added, "Good morning."

Before they could say more, Ah-Un distracted them both by bellowing, stamping the dewy grass beneath its clawed feet. Rin ran to its side. "Ah-Un-chan," she murmured, stroking its neck. "What's wrong? Is there something out there?"

The demon was growling at the trees on the opposite side of the clearing, raking up soil and swishing its tail in agitation. Rin's gaze followed Ah-Un's, and she gasped. Could it be? "Sessoumaru-sama, Sesshoumaru-sama!" she shrieked, launching herself across the clearing with the silent sprint of a practiced thief. "You've returned!"

"Rin, get back here this _instant_!" Jaken squawked, shuffling after her as fast as he could. "By the gods, if something happens to you while I am here, Sesshoumaru-sama would split me in half!" About to continue, Jaken cut his tirade short with a gargling sound deep within his throat. "My lord!"

It was indeed Sesshoumaru who had stepped out silently from the trees. He was a tall, imposing figure, with long silver hair, an elegantly embroidered haori and hakama, and armor strategically placed to de-emphasize his missing left arm. He was all ice and elegance, his golden eyes cold, the maroon youkai markings on his cheek stark against his pale skin. With a mere backhand slap, he could send a human flying a hundred feet, never mind the damage he could do with his vicious claws and the two swords belted at his waist. He was feared throughout the Western territories, the lands he had inherited from his father, and well-known beyond those lands. Naraku and Inuyasha were among the few who lived after crossing him.

It was this demon, who silenced armies with a glare and killed with but a fraction of his strength, who Rin rushed to, grabbing his leg in an enthusiastic hug, still shrieking his name. "Did you bring anything, Sesshoumaru-sama?" she asked him eagerly. "I have been so _bored_, but I was a good girl, ask Jaken-sama—"

"Hush, Rin," the inuyoukai murmured, his deep voice barely audible above Rin's babbling and Ah-Un's nervous sidling. But she heard and instantly stopped speaking, although she did not release his leg until he raised an eyebrow at her. Then, she let go with a giggle and moved back several steps.

Muttering under his breath about poorly-mannered children that made him look bad, the imp bowed deeply to the demon he served. "It is an honor to see you again, my lord," he greeted, head still at the level of his knees. "I trust your errand went well?"

Instead of answering, Sesshoumaru looked down at Rin, who was silently bouncing on her heels, looking up at him almost as if he were a favorite uncle who had promised her a treat. "Rin," he told her, "go tend to Ah-Un."

Rin knew a dismissal when she heard one, and with a nod, skipped to the other side of the clearing where the two-headed demon was still lowing in distress, apparently uneasy with such a powerful aura after so long. "Shhh, it's all right, Ah-Un-chan," she murmured, gently taking its reins and stroking the left head's neck. "You remember Sesshoumaru-sama. He is kind, he won't hurt you. He has business with Jaken-sama right now, but then he will come and greet you, and you'll remember him. It's okay, shh, shh."

She cast a glance toward Sesshoumaru and Jaken, who had turned their backs toward her and were clearly discussing something of great importance. She was puzzled, but already knew that neither would choose to discuss anything with her. Sesshoumaru-sama had been gone almost constantly since she had been kidnapped and almost killed by Kohaku-kun. She was sure it had something to do with Kohaku-kun's master, Naraku. There had been a hard fight, that much was clear, but Sesshoumaru-sama and Jaken-sama rarely shared the details of Sesshoumaru-sama's battles with her. All she could do was obediently wait.

-- -- --

**Feudal Era, late July**

Miroku sighed as he trudged up the hill to Kaede's hut. He had spent the day speaking to villagers who had just returned from a trading journey, asking about any rumors of strange youkai and the like. However, they had heard nothing. All they spoke of was the toll of war, a constant, ugly background to their own battle with Naraku, and difficulties with the crops. Nothing he didn't know already.

He heard a rushing sound and looked up to find Sango riding on Kirara, outfitted in her exterminating uniform. He glanced toward the forest where she was headed, momentarily concerned, before he remembered that she had intended to train today, saying she was getting out of practice.

She was frustrated and restless; he could tell. They all were. But with Inuyasha's frequent absences and that small, lingering hope that Kagome just might return after more than a month had passed, as well as the lack of leads on Naraku's new hiding place, they had a hard time committing to a prolonged trip outside the village. It seemed they were all reluctant to move on from this state of limbo.

To his surprise, instead of continuing to the forest, Sango halted Kirara in the air, then directed her to the ground beside Miroku. Emerging from the surge of flames that accompanied the cat youkai's transformation, she said to the monk, "Houshi-sama, someone is coming. There is movement in the trees."

He turned and squinted into the darkness of the forest. "Really? I sense no threatening presence."

"Even so," she said, the hand holding Hiraikotsu deceptively relaxed, "for someone to be casually walking through Inuyasha's Forest is a bit odd. There are many youkai there still, particularly now that Naraku has gone to ground. Whoever is coming clearly is powerful enough not to fear them."

He nodded thoughtfully and adjusted his grip on his staff. "Shall we greet them together?"

"Let's."

They started toward the forest, Kirara padding along beside Sango, easily keeping up even in her kitten form. Before they had gone far, a light emerged from the forest, and Miroku felt himself pale. "That…is that Kikyou-sama's shinidamachuu?"

_Don't be stupid, feeling so uneasy all of a sudden_, he scolded himself. _There is no Kagome to offend now. Perhaps she is here to help us._

"It is," Sango said softly, likely thinking the same thing. She adjusted Hiraikotsu, settling the carry-strap across her chest. "Greetings, Kikyou-sama," she called out as her white and red clothing became visible. As she stepped out of the trees, Miroku saw that Inuyasha had apparently already found her, as he was walking beside her.

"Greetings," he called to her. "Do you have any news?"

Kikyou simply looked away. He was somewhat taken aback by her abruptness. In their past meetings, although her attention had always been focused primarily on Inuyasha and Kagome, he couldn't recall her being quite so, well, _rude_. He looked from the miko to Inuyasha. "Is something the matter?"

Inuyasha also looked away. His voice seemed almost bitter as he said dully, "We're going to ask Kaede if Kikyou can stay in her hut. Do you guys mind?"

Miroku and Sango exchanged startled glances. After a moment, Miroku cautiously answered, "I suppose not…how long does she intend to stay?"

"It'll be a while."

Sango turned to the miko. "Kikyou-sama, may I ask why you wish to stay?"

The woman slowly turned her gaze back to them. Miroku almost felt pain at how similar she and their missing friend looked. Did Kikyou intend to replace Kagome? Was it Inuyasha's idea? Was that why she looked somehow ashamed? "I need companions now," she said softly. "I need protection."

"Why, what happened?" Miroku asked, startled. Since when did Kikyou come to them, _asking_ for protection?

"I'm not…I…" She closed her cold gray eyes and sighed. "Forgive me. This is quite difficult for me to admit."

She glanced at Inuyasha's face, and both quickly turned away from each other, as if in shame, or anger. Staring intently at the grass, she half whispered, "I am pregnant."

_(end)_

-- -- --

_Oooooooooh, plot twist, oooooooooh!!! I hope you enjoyed, and I hope the intervening years haven't made my writing skills go down the tubes. That's what happens when you major in science and never write essays anymore. *sigh*_

_Thanks for reading!_


	6. Life Goes On

**Blood Ties, Blood Lies**

**Chapter Six: Life Goes On**

_Yay, another chapter being released in an astonishingly timely manner! Don't get used to it! I actually already had most of this written by the time I'd decided to post chapter 5, so that's why this update is coming so soon. But never fear, I do intend to continue it as quickly as possible! Thank you so much to those readers who have returned, and thank you also to my new readers and reviewers. It's your commentary and praise that warm a poor writer's heart. ^_^_

-- -- --

**Modern Era, late July**

School hadn't started up again yet, but Kagome was already hard at work. She had summer homework to do, as well as plenty of studying to catch up with her classes and prepare for the high school entrance exams.

She sat at her desk with a small fan blowing in her face, dressed in a tank top and shorts. "Ahhhh…it's so hot!" she groaned, fanning herself with her workbook. "I can't believe jii-chan dumped purification sake onto the air conditioner! His so-called powers don't even work anyways."

She paused and slumped thoughtfully in her chair. Rituals performed by her grandfather certainly didn't seem to work. However, the ritual he had shown her to seal the well had worked very well when _she_ performed it, much to jii-chan's surprise. Since then, never once had any hint of blue light emerged from it, no voices, no nagging feelings. Her connection to the past had been cut off quite cleanly.

It had been hard to deal with at first. For weeks, she had grieved, had shut herself in her room and acted quite oddly around her family. But what was done was done. She had done what was necessary, what was right, even though it pained her even now.

Kagome sighed. _What I wouldn't give to hear his voice or to be on his strong back. I'd face a hundred demons just to stroke his ears again._

But there was no way out of it. It would be wrong for her to go back. What she had learned a month ago while researching had devastated her, ripped through her like a spear. She felt disgusting and dirty, half wondering if she would even be able to use her powers of purification if she returned to Inuyasha's side. If only she had never found out…

-- -- --

_Takeda Katsu: ~1500 AD_

_Little is known about Katsu of the Takeda clan. He was adopted by the clan around the age of fifteen and became as a younger son to the leader at the time, Lord Hatori. Made a general by his adopted brother, Lord Shinnosuke, he went on to lead the Takeda's army to many victories before retiring and marrying Aiko of the Nishitori clan. They raised two children, and he died at approximately the age of sixty. This is all the factual knowledge available._

_According to legend, Katsu was not an ordinary human. Some stories say he was a youkai who so loved Aiko that he gave up his youkai powers and took on a human form to have her. Others say that he was blessed by the gods and grew unnaturally quickly, reaching a height of eight feet by adulthood with strength to match. Another says that he was plagued by possession by a youkai that sometimes gave him unusual strength and other times took over his body and mind completely._

_Katsu's parentage is also unknown. Some claim that he was born to peasants who trained him in combat and etiquette so that he would gain the lord's favor and win them a softer life. Others say he came from a faraway land, a lord's heir in his own right. Others still claim that he was born to a hanyou and a miko, who died in each other's arms for the "sin" of their love. There are also stories that he was found as an infant, alone in a cursed forest, or that as a child he wandered into a town, wounded and remembering nothing of his past._

-- -- --

Immersed in copying information down for her family tree, it had taken a moment for the connection to click. But the second time she read it, Kagome understood why her stomach had dropped so abruptly. There were many mysteries surrounding Takeda Katsu, at least according to historians. But, given the time frame and the legends whispered of her ancestor, she knew the truth.

_Kikyou got Inuyasha after all_, she thought, a bitter smile on her lips. _And they raised a family to boot. Maybe Inuyasha wished for her to come back to life? That must be it. Or maybe…_ She laughed. _Maybe I was born so I could go back to that time and somehow return her soul to her?_

Kagome stood. She had followed this train of thought countless times in the past month. It did nothing except make her feel worse and worse. She had even found herself throwing up in the bathroom several times, disgusted with her naiveté, by the rotten luck that had led her to love the _only_ person in the Sengoku Jidai that she absolutely must not love. The irony!

Going to the window, she stared down at the wellhouse. _He isn't coming anymore. We aren't going to fight anymore, he won't ever have Ramen again…_

She felt something like a shiver pass through her. It had been a month, but she still couldn't erase the memory of his warmth. The hanyou seemed to radiate heat, strength, and safety. Those few times when he held her, either with one arm around her shoulder or an outright hug, seemed burned into her very body's memory. It was tortuously easy to remember his firm, lean muscles, how gentle his claws could be, his defiant golden eyes, his clean, warm scent. It seemed the harder she tried to forget him, the more she remembered.

_Gods, this hurts,_ she thought grimly. _Does he miss me like this? Do the others miss me like this?_

Thinking of her other friends made Kagome sigh heavily. They had been like a family to her, all the more dear to her because she had _chosen_ to cherish them rather than being born to it. Miroku's light-heartedness, Sango's strength, and Shippou's strange, childish wisdom seemed so far away, and yet she half-felt they would be right at her shoulder when she turned, as they always had been in the Sengoku Jidai. She missed Kirara, both adorable and dependable, Myouga-jii-chan, for all his cowardice, and Kouga, with his blunt charm.

She missed the life there, too. There, she had a purpose. There was always something to be accomplished. However, here, she had no idea where she was going. She studied to pass the time. Studying would land her in a better school, maybe even in a good college. But where would she go after that? Become a doctor? A businesswoman? Return home to take over the shrine? Would she find someone else to love? Someone else to marry? The future here was so much more uncertain. And all of this work…for what purpose? Everything she thought of paled at the memory of Naraku's cold, dark face, the suffering in her friends' eyes. What could she live for here that would hold a candle to the work she had done on the other side of the well?

"Maybe all I can live for is knowing that I'm not there," she muttered, eyes still locked on the wellhouse. Under the hot summer sun, it looked so unassuming. So harmless. And yet something so serene had brought her so much pain—the unrequited love, the wounds, the worrying, the jealousy, and now this cold, self-disgust. "Is this ever going to _end_?" she growled, whirling away from the window and beginning to pace restlessly around her bedroom. "Haven't I suffered enough? That damn hanyou, stupid Kikyou, Naraku, and that stupid project…my schoolwork, missing my friends…I just want to be done with it all!"

She sat heavily on her bed. Even in her anger, the memory of Inuyasha's smirking face made her heart painfully skip a beat. _Doesn't the hurting ever end? Can't I just forget it all and be done with it?_

As she turned her head to gaze out the window again, a light flashed from her nightstand. It was the sunlight, reflected off the tiny glass jar that she had once carried constantly around her neck.

Kagome winced. In some ways, this was the worst part. At first, wallowing in disgust and grief, she had entirely forgotten about the Shikon shards still in her possession. The desperate need to put distance between Inuyasha and herself—whether it was to cut her wrongdoing short or merely to protect her heart—had consumed her, and afterward, the heartbreak had driven her half mad. One of the first things she did after discovering the truth about her lineage was kick her yellow backpack under her bed, as hard as she could, never mind the pain of toes colliding with heavy textbooks. It hadn't been until she returned to her senses that she remembered this little jar inside it, containing two pieces of perhaps the most dangerous magical object in existence.

Although she would rather have turned away, her hand seemed to reach out on its own for the jar. She rolled it between her fingers, examining the pale pink fragments as they tumbled over each other and sparkled in the light. _What on earth am I going to do with you two?_ she mused.

The moment she recalled she had the powerful Shikon shards in her possession, she knew she and her family were in danger. She had raced to her grandfather's room, shaken him out of his afternoon nap, and asked for the most powerful concealing and warding spells he knew.

Now, hopefully, no youkai that had survived into this age would sense the shards. They were all safe.

"Will they need these?" Kagome murmured guiltily.

But she couldn't do it. The thought of opening the well again, of returning to her friends, handing them this jar, and then saying, "I'm sorry. I'm leaving. _Again_," made her heart squeeze painfully. The thought of the hurt and anger she knew she would see on Inuyasha's face made it even worse. And having to _explain_ it…by the gods, Hell could be no worse than that.

_Besides, this way Naraku has no way to complete the Jewel and wish on it_, she thought righteously. She tried to squash the next thought, but of course it was too late. _Inuyasha and Kikyou-sama won't be able to, either._

She knew it was selfish. Perhaps without the aid of the Shikon no Tama on _their_ side, her friends would forever be locked in battle with Naraku. _Much like within the jewel itself_, she thought with an ironic smile. But in the end, no matter what justification she had to return the shards or keep them here, she was simply too much of a coward to go back.

"Forgive me, Inuyasha," Kagome whispered, setting the jar back on her nightstand. "I'm not strong enough to handle this. I'm sorry I'm so weak."

She felt her eyes start to water, and abruptly stood up, rubbing at them vigorously. What was done was done. She had made her choice, and she had to live with the consequences. After all, life would go on, with or without her, and she already knew that as hard as moving on was, letting time pass without her would only make this tragedy worse.

-- -- --

**Feudal Era, late July**

Sango didn't even know how to react. A thousand words rose to her lips and died before she found the conviction to speak them. With who? How? When? Expressions of anger, confusion, and fear. "Congratulations?" she said haltingly, unconsciously touching the comfortingly familiar Hiraikotsu slung on her back. "I take it this is a happy event?"

The silent look Kikyou leveled at her made the demon slayer cringe. _Clearly I was wrong._

"Kikyou-sama…how did this happen?" Miroku asked her, his forehead furrowed in confusion. For a man who constantly went around asking women to bear his children, his question was rather ironic. Still, Sango couldn't help but feel grateful that he had directed Kikyou's attention away from her.

"I mean…after all, your body is not that of a living woman. I would not have thought you…capable of carrying life. How do you even know? Forgive me, but I would assume you no longer experience…well, your courses." As perverted as the monk could be, he blushed, and somewhere beyond her confusion Sango was glad to see he was at least embarrassed by talking about _that_, if not other things.

The miko's hand, clasped tightly in Inuyasha's, squeezed. "I thought the same, houshi," she said softly. "That is why I, too, am shocked. As for how I know, usually after a month or two, I can sense a seed of the infant's…awareness. I know when its mind and soul begin developing. So even without an interruption in the womanly cycle, I know. Nothing else feels anything like the birth of a new mind into the world." Her lips tightened and she abruptly fell silent, as if she were afraid she would start babbling in her uneasiness.

Sango studied the pair standing before her and Miroku. Inuyasha refused to meet their eyes, but his hand was firm around Kikyou's. There was an odd vulnerability about the miko that Sango had never seen before. Was she simply nervous, as all women were upon their first pregnancy? Was she afraid? Was she…ashamed?

She glared at Inuyasha again. _They didn't. They couldn't have. Not when Kagome…_

From the sharp look he gave Inuyasha, Miroku appeared to have arrived at the same conclusion, but he said nothing of it. Instead, he extended one arm behind him, gesturing towards Kaede's hut on the outskirts of the village. "I cannot speak for Kaede-sama. However, I can hardly assume that she would refuse her own ane-ue a home in a time when she needs protection and companionship. As for me, I welcome you."

His purple gaze shifted in Sango's direction. She felt his eyes on her rather than seeing them…he was so _intense_. And the message he meant to send her was quite clear. Sango stepped forward, feeling her lips thin with disapproval. But with great force of will, she pushed those unpleasant thoughts aside. Instead, she forced herself to think, _What would Kagome do?_

She offered her hand to Kikyou. "I as well cannot speak for Kaede-sama. But as far as I am concerned, you are a fellow woman in need. How can I refuse you?"

"You have my gratitude," Kikyou murmured. She glanced at Inuyasha before slipping her hand out of his and taking Sango's instead. The lack of warmth in her hand was an unpleasant shock, but she kept the surprise out of her face. "I am sorry for imposing."

Sango shook her head. She responded, "You may indeed prove to be helpful to us…if you wouldn't mind, Kikyou-sama. Kaede-sama is getting on in years, and it certainly is a relief to have someone around to care for her. Also, your ability to sense shards may help us. Again, if you so wish."

She continued in this vein, politely turning aside Kikyou's murmured apologies and doing her best to be welcoming and open, although both women knew that she was anything but happy to have her here. With careful steps, she guided the priestess to Kaede's hut, leaving Inuyasha and Miroku behind them. During the whole walk, she could feel Miroku's gaze boring into her back.

_Don't ask. Not now. Not yet._

-- -- --

"She has arrived," the pale girl said in her breathy, wisp of a voice. Everything about her could be described as wispy, ethereal, not fully there. She was small and skinny and wore a simple white kimono. Her hair, too, was white, and its thin locks hung limp on her shoulders. Even the flower in her hair was delicate and frail. She looked like a gust of wind would tear her apart.

The most substantial thing about the girl was the mirror in her hands. It was round, a man's handspan across, and silver formed an ornate frame around it. She held it before her, facing away from her. In the small, dark room, it seemed to glow with an unearthly light. Her audience was still intent on the image in the mirror, but she stared somewhat blankly at them. "It remains to be seen whether she will stay," she continued.

She blinked, and the image of Inuyasha and his companions faded, to be replaced by her audience members' displeased faces. "My power has run out. Observation must be postponed."

A man snarled and stood, advancing toward her. "Useless little wench!" he roared at her. "A scrap of chatter and your power's fuckin' gone? Show us more! Them little scenes ain't worth a rat's shit!"

He was a big, heavily muscled and battle-scarred, dressed in the finest leather armor money could buy. The girl merely looked up at him, seemingly oblivious to his rage, and repeated, "My power has run out."

The man growled and swung a fist back to strike her. There was a soft clinking sound, and from the darkness in the corner shot a weighted chain that wrapped tightly around his wrist. The person on the other end yanked cruelly, and the angry man's knees buckled as his arm was twisted back _hard_. He didn't make a sound, but his breathing was labored and his teeth ground as he tried to unwind the chain.

He froze when a cold voice began to speak. "General, your actions dishearten me. My underlings will behave as _I_ decide, and _I _decide when they deserve punishment. Not you. A human such as you, skilled in combat though you may be, has no hold over them. Do you not recall our agreement?"

The chain loosened, and the man got to his feet, gingerly testing to see if his arm had been dislocated. It had not, which was good for him. Such an injury in his line of work was deadly. "Oh, aye, I remember," he muttered, as though it pained him more than his shoulder to admit it. "We're t'dance at your command, be that right?"

The voice was silken and cultured compared to the captain's rough, poor man's drawl. "Indeed, but after all, the reward you reap for the dance will be repayment enough, will it not? Now leave us, I have plans to make. I will send Kanna for you when your services are required."

The man glared into the corner again. Of course this creature would choose to send that pale, insignificant scrap to order him around, just to trample on his pride. Gritting his teeth as a bolt of pain shot through his shoulder, he bowed and quickly left the room, sparing a final glare for the girl.

Once he was gone, the voice commanded, "To me, Kanna."

She walked into the dark corner, the mirror's glow slowly illuminating the speaker's face. His skin was pale, not bright pale like hers, but like the skin of a corpse. His red eyes were fixated on Kanna's mirror. "Kanna, you disappoint me. These shreds are barely enough to piece together the doings of Inuyasha's little gang. It is imperative that we have information enough to bring this plan to fruition." There was contempt in his voice, but little anger. Displays of emotion were wasted on Kanna, a youkai whose very essence was nothingness. She responded to commands and questions, but that was all. "You will continue to observe them," he ordered her, "and report everything to me. We will eventually have a more…consistent source than a mirror that loses to the power of that decrepit old miko. Kagura!"

Another figure moved in the shadows. A female youkai stepped into the light cast by the mirror. She seemed almost entirely human, a dangerously beautiful woman, but for her cruel red eyes and pointed ears. "Yes, Naraku?" she asked disinterestedly. Unlike Kanna, she had emotions aplenty, including a loathing for this hanyou she was forced to serve.

"You and Kohaku are preparing the spy. When will preparations be finished?"

"Soon enough," she drawled in her alluring voice. She snapped open the fan in her hand and waved it nonchalantly, sending a breeze toward her face. "We await your orders, master."

"Do not get flippant with me, woman," Naraku snarled. A slime-green tentacle rose from the floor and wrapped around her throat, dragging her down to her knees. "I know you have been sneaking around and toying around with being defiant. In this matter, you will not disobey or betray me. If you do, I will grind your heart into powder and bury it under a mountain, far from the kiss of your precious winds."

She grimaced and wriggled against the tentacle. In falling, she had come uncomfortably close to the mess that was Naraku's body below the neck. In their last encounter with Inuyasha and Sesshoumaru, his body had been pulverized and reduced to a heaving, shifting mass of flesh that made her ill to look at. It pained her to think that her freedom-loving heart was imprisoned within that squelching heap. "I understand, Naraku. I will obey your every command."

"Good." The tentacle loosened and returned inside the flesh mound. Kagura quickly got to her feet.

"Perhaps we should have a test run. Bring the spy in. Kanna, fetch our general. We shall watch to see whether our spy is able to remain undetected. I certainly hope she has found ways around Inuyasha's nose and the spiritual powers of our miko and houshi friends."

The two female youkai left the room, leaving Naraku with his third servant. "Kohaku, you did not tear his arm out. Such mercy is unusual. Are you feeling the pangs of human compassion again?"

He turned to look into the very corner, where Sango's twelve-year-old brother stood. In his hands was a sickle, attached to the weighted chain that had stopped the angry captain in his tracks. "My lord, you told me injuring the general would be an inconvenience," he said dully.

"Yes, it would certainly take a while for the one who kills him and takes his place to learn the ins and outs of our plot. It took long enough for _this_ fool to understand who is in charge here," Naraku agreed, sounding amused. "How trying that it is necessary to break in so many of those who serve me." He smiled maliciously at the boy. "Yet how gratifying to see the suffering and humiliation, yes?"

"Of course, my lord," he agreed tonelessly.

And Naraku had to laugh at the cruel irony, that Kohaku, now one of his most trusted servants, had suffered just so. And when Naraku was so inclined, the boy continued to suffer, when he was allowed to remember the companions he had killed, and the depth of his betrayal to his sister.

_Humans are such bountiful sources of entertainment_, he thought in satisfaction. _Let us see how long my newest trick can keep me amused._

_(end)_

-- -- --

_See you next chapter!_


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